Astronauts take cover as space debris flies by

SIX astronauts were forced to take refuge aboard the International Space Station’s “lifeboat” crafts yesterday, bracing for the threat of a collision with floating space debris, the Russian space agency, Roskosmos, said in a statement.

“A situation arose linked to unidentified ‘space trash’ passing very close to the space station,” Roskosmos said. “The crew was told to take their places aboard the Soyuz spacecraft.”

The space junk missed the vulnerable orbiting station by just 250 metres yesterday as astronauts were prepared to jump ship, RIA Novosti, the Russian state news agency cited an official as saying.

It is not the first time space station crews have scrambled to shelter from space junk. Crews are routinely put on alert to prepare to move out of harm’s way.

Three crew members were forced briefly to evacuate the space station in March 2009.

The station — a $100 billion (€69.6bn) project by 16 nations under construction about 355kmabove the earth since 1998 — is currently manned by three Russians, two Americans and a Japanese astronaut.

Only 10% of all objects in Earth’s orbit are satellites. The rest is trash: spent rocket stages, defunct satellites, acceleration blocks and other debris, a spokesman for the agency told Russian state news agency Itar-tass.

Even small objects present a danger to astronauts in orbit, where trash the size of an egg can travel at dangerous speeds.

Space debris is a growing hazard, with ever more satellites in orbit, and one of the most important challenges of future orbital ventures, industry expert Vladimir Gubarev said.

“Everything is spaced out just some 100 metres from each other,” said Gubarev, a renown space journalist and the Soviet spokesman for the joint Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975. “One satellite gets in the way of the next. It’s way too crowded.”