NASA Astronauts Aboard the International Space Station Make Urgent Computer Repair

First Posted: Apr 23, 2014 07:41 PM EDT
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The astronauts aboard the International Space Station finally received the 5,000 pounds of cargo they needed after the launch was delayed a month by SpaceX and NASA. Two astronauts conducted a spacewalk to repair a dead computer today.

Astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Steven Swanson replaced the dead computer in under an hour. It was a critical backup computer that died nearly two weeks ago and which would have been repaired on time if the SpaceX-3 Commercial Resupply Services flight had conducted its launch as planned back on March 16. But delays caused the cargo to not be delivered until this past Sunday.

The spacewalk and computer (also known as a multiplexer-demultiplexer) repair took only one hour and 36 minutes and it was streamed live on NASA TV. Engineers asked the astronauts to see if they could determine what caused the first-ever failure of multiplexer-demultiplexers (MDMs) inside and outside the ISS. Mastracchio and Swanson were unable to identify anything that may have caused the issues.

Worries mounted after the backup computer failed because if the primary computer experienced any issues during that time period, the entire space station could have been in jeopardy. The primary and backup computers control the pointing of the solar wings and radiators. They also control the movement of the robot-arm rail cart, which is used to help construct the ISS by grappling and moving modules or by moving astronauts into position to perform any work that's needed.

The astronauts worked as a team to complete the mission in under the 2.5-hour timeline. They loosened the bolts and removed the 50-lbs. computer and reattached the new computer within an hour. All ISS computer systems are now restored thanks to the astronauts' 179th spacewalk in the space station's history.

Those aboard the ISS will examine the dead computer and update Mission Control on whatever happened to it.

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