NASA
engineers are studying the impact of excessive vibrations aboard the
International Space Station to make sure
the unexpected shaking did not damage the $100 billion orbital lab.
Engineers
are checking the space station's integrity after a Jan. 14 thruster firing aimed at
boosting the outpost's orbit to meet the expected arrival of two spacecraft
later this month. But the two-minute, 22-second rocket engine firing led to "higher-than-usual
structural oscillations" on the 10-year-old
space station, NASA officials said in a Jan. 24 update.
Reports of
the space station's vibrations were posted in NASA's daily status updates on
the outpost and first reported by USA Today. Video of the move obtained
by MSNBC shows a wildly shaking camera inside the space station during
the Jan. 14 maneuver.
NASA
officials have said an initial review of the space station's subsystems "have
not shown any off-nominal results," according to a Jan. 29 update.
Earlier
today, mission managers at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston cleared the
space station's structure of any concerns for another planned thruster firing initially slated for Wednesday, NASA
spokesperson Kelly Humphries said during the agency's daily mission commentary.
But that planned maneuver was cancelled by Russian flight controllers, who said it was no longer required, he added.
The space
station is in an acceptable position to jettison an older Russian cargo ship,
Progress 31, on Thursday, and link up with its Progress 32 replacement on Feb.
13, Humphries said. The space station is also in position to meet NASA's space
shuttle Discovery, which is slated
to launch Feb. 12 and dock at the orbiting lab two days later to deliver
the final pair of U.S. solar arrays.
Humphries
said the decision to cancel Wednesday's space station maneuver did force
mission planners to reschedule the planned March 25 launch of a Russian Soyuz
spacecraft carrying the outpost's next crew and American space tourist Charles
Simonyi. That Soyuz TMA-14 spacecraft will now launch one day later in order to
meet the space station in the preferred position, he added.
The
International Space Station is currently home to Expedition
18 commander Michael Fincke and flight engineer Sandra Magnus, both of
NASA, and Russian flight engineer Yury Lonchakov. Magnus is slated to return
home later this month after her replacement, Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata,
arrives aboard the shuttle Discovery.
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