On Tuesday, July 25, NASA lost contact with the International Space Station for several tens of minutes. This happened due to power outages. The crew on board was not in any danger at that time.
Loss of communication with the ISS
The Mission Control Center in Houston, Texas lost contact with the International Space Station. It happened on Tuesday, and NASA, which owns the Johnson Space Center, from which communication with the station takes place, almost immediately reported this event.
The loss of communication was caused by a power outage in the very center. It was connected with the improvement of its equipment and lasted for 20 minutes. All this time, the astronauts were not in any danger. Moreover, they were warned about the situation through Russian communication channels.
A little later, the electrical power supply, and with it, the connection was restored. This happened due to the inclusion of emergency power systems. Their specialists have used them for the first time, for all the time, since they were first installed.
Can the connection disappear forever?
The loss of communication with the ISS is one of the biggest fears about the development of near-Earth space among those who live in the mass consciousness. And NASA is really worried about this. In particular, they are well aware that the loss of contact can occur for completely earthly reasons.
For example, a space center can be damaged by a hurricane, they happen quite often in Texas. In this case, a backup center has been built a few kilometers from Houston, capable of performing all the same functions as the main one. However, this time, they decided not to use it.
But even if Houston goes silent for a long time, there are at least a dozen control centers and communication stations all over the Earth that are able to establish contact with the ISS. Therefore, the probability of long-term loss of communication with it for “earthly” reasons is extremely small.
According to phys.org
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