Jerry Linenger dons a mask during his mission to the World in 1997. Credit: NASA
- Keep up with the latest research. There are, in fact, two fire suppression systems on the International Space Station: the water foam system in the Russian sections, and the carbon dioxide system in the US area. NASA is now working on more modern method"water mist" fire suppression based on the continuing trend seen in terrestrial protection areas such as electronics and shipping cabins. This system emits small particles like an atomizer that are only tens of microns throughout and acts like a gas. Urban said the system is in the final stages of development and should be ready for use at the station within a couple of years.
One message in 2011 from NASA about the accident also highlighted the importance of preparing for emergency and security to mitigate fires when they occur. "More effective warning systems could save a few seconds of reaction time, which, in a crisis, could mean the difference between success and failure," he said. You can read the rest of this post
On February 23, 1997, a fire broke out at space station"Mir", which managed to be eliminated in time. Flights into space have always been associated with great risk for the crew. But staying on a space station is also unsafe for astronauts. Orbital station "Mir" was launched into orbit in February 1986, operated until 2001, when it was sunk in pacific ocean. Over the 15 years of operation at the station, many incidents have occurred. We will talk about the five most serious incidents on the Mir space station.
Fire
On February 23, 1997, an atmosphere regeneration oxygen bomb ignited at the station. At the station at that moment there were six people from the 22nd and 23rd expeditions: Valery Korzun, Alexander Kaleri, Vasily Tsibliyev, Alexander Lazutkin, Reinhold Ewald and Jerry Linenger. Two Soyuz TM ships were docked to the station, which made it possible to evacuate all the people, but one of the ships was cut off. The situation was worsened by the fact that the station was smoky.
The entire crew put on gas masks. After the source of fire was eliminated due to smoke, the astronauts had to wear respirators for some time. The crew members themselves were able to put out the fire before it got out of control. The investigation showed that the fire was caused by a single defect in the oxygen cartridge.
Air conditioning leak
During the 23rd expedition in March 1997, the air conditioning system failed - first, the Elektron oxygen generation units failed in succession, and then the refrigerant began to leak - poisonous ethylene glycol. The temperature at the station rose to 50 °C at the maximum allowable 28 °C, and humidity increased.
By the end of March, the source of the leak was found. On April 6, Progress-M34 was launched from Earth, containing Additional materials for repairing the station, oxygen bombs for regeneration, water supplies. By the end of April, a dozen cracks in the tubes of the station's air conditioning system were found and repaired. The station returned to normal operation. The Atlantis shuttle mission STS-84, which was under threat of cancellation due to technical problems at the station, was cleared. She delivered oxygen generation units to the station to replace the failed ones and water supplies.
Collision between Progress-M34 and Spektr module
On June 25, 1997, during an experiment on manual docking in the BPS + TORU mode (ballistic precision rendezvous - teleoperator control mode) of Progress-M34, a loss of control of the space truck occurred. As a result, Progress crashed into the station, damaging the solar panels and leaving a hole in the Spektr module with an area of 2 cm2.
The MCC urgently gave the command to seal the module, thus ensuring the life support of the station. The situation was complicated by the fact that cables ran through the hatch connecting the module to the station. The shutdown of the module resulted in a temporary loss of electricity generated by the station - with the de-energization of the module, the Spektra solar panels were turned off, which provided 40% of the electricity. It was only by August 1997 that the power supply to the Mir station was fully restored. Crew members of Expedition 23 were awarded state awards: Lazutkin received the title of Hero of Russia, Tsibliyev - the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, III degree.
Loss of orientation
In September 1997, as a result of a computer error, Mir lost its orientation to the Sun. For astronomical observations of the Sun, Moon, planets and stars, it is necessary to orient the telescopes or the entire station accordingly. The solar collectors of the power supply system must be constantly directed towards the Sun. And therefore, having lost the right direction, the station was left without the main source of energy.
Also, a certain orientation is necessary for various antenna devices, which means that control was also lost, since the crew could not accurately find out the location of the station. It took 24 hours before control of the station was restored.
Loss of oxygen
On August 28, 1997, another trouble happened on Mir. In the evening, shortly before lights out, the Electron hydrolysis unit, which produces oxygen, spontaneously shut down. The astronauts tried several times to turn it on, but the Electron immediately turned off again. From the Earth it was recommended to postpone the repair of the installation until the morning and use a solid-fuel oxygen generator - a checker that produces oxygen when burned. However, the flare did not catch fire.
Remembering that in February, due to exactly the same checkers (produced by the Moscow NPO Nauka), a serious fire broke out at the station, the MCC ordered that checkers no longer be used and still try to repair Electron. Fortunately, the malfunction was fixed in just a few minutes (it turned out that some kind of contact had broken), and already at half past ten, the normal supply of oxygen to the station was restored.
However, it was this incident that was the last straw - since mid-1999, due to difficulties in financing the flight program of the Mir station, in order to save money, the operating mode of the complex was changed by including relatively long unmanned sections in the program. And in 2001, it was decided to flood the orbital station in the Pacific Ocean.
, Feoktistov , Semyonov and Tregub who arrived from Evpatoria .
We have a "veil" on board, - Volkov transmitted to Earth. According to the code, "veil" meant either smoke or fire. On Earth, they forgot about the code and began to ask again what kind of "veil" is. Negotiations with the Earth were conducted not by the crew commander, but by Volkov. He could not stand it and, cursing, openly said:
We have a fire! Now let's go to the ship. Further, he said that they could not find instructions for urgent evacuation and descent and asked the Earth to dictate to them what to do and in what sequence. In Podlipki, it was possible to establish duplication of negotiations between the crew of the DOS and NIP-16.
Report the data for urgent undocking, - Volkov demanded very excitedly.
Earth's answer was, after a long search, this:
See pages 110-120 for emergency exit procedures, which describe the procedures for transitioning to the descent vehicle. After the transition, de-mothball the ship according to the instructions on 7K-T, pages 98, a and 98, b. Decoupling is standard. Prepare pages 133-136. Landing only as directed by Earth. Take your time. The remote is turned off - and the smoke should stop. If you leave the station, then leave the absorber of harmful impurities on. Take headache pills. According to telemetry, CO2 and O2 are normal. The decision on the transition and undocking is made by the commander. Dobrovolsky realized that it was time to take over the connection with the Earth:
- "Dawn", I - "Amber". We decided not to rush. PUNA is off. While we are on duty in twos, one will rest. Don't worry, we're in the mood to keep working.
- "Yantar-1", I'm "Dawn". We have analyzed the state of the on-board systems and believe that the measures taken guarantee normal operation. We hope that you will continue to work according to the regular program. The smells will go away. On June 17, we recommend you a day of rest, then enter the mode. Please note that after leaving the NPC zone, the ship "Akademik Sergei Korolev" can hear you well.
From further negotiations, we realized that Dobrovolsky and Patsaev "muted" Volkov's emotions and sent him to rest. After a couple of turns, "Academician Sergei Korolev" reported that everything was in order on board. "Yantar-1 and -3" had dinner, and "Yantar-2" is resting. When everyone calmed down a little, Mishin gathered all those who experienced an unexpected emergency and instructed Tregub to return to Evpatoria on NIP-16 to restore order. Me and Raushenbach - to fly there with the necessary specialists in five days. Mishin himself planned to fly with the minister to the test site on June 20 to prepare and launch the H1N 6L.
The launch is scheduled for June 27th. We will spend a day on the analysis of comments. This means that the minister and I will fly to you in Evpatoria on June 29. If they don’t have more fires there, prepare all the materials for a regular landing on June 30th. A commotion under the code "veil" passed through all the "floors" of our hierarchy, up to the chairman of the military-industrial complex. Subsequent reassuring reports from the Evpatoria control center and from space eased Mozzhorin's position. He was instructed to prepare the text of the TASS report about the incident on orbital station and in this regard, about the safe, but premature return of the crew. Now the need for such a TASS message has disappeared and it was possible to easily endorse the standard messages about the station's flight, the work of the cosmonauts and their well-being.
On June 20, Mishin, taking with him Okhapkin, Simakin, a complete "set" of representatives of services and enterprises, participants in the preparation and launch of H1, flew to the training ground. After the departure of the expedition led by Mishin, there was a short lull. I decided to use it to reduce the "debts" accumulated in correspondence on promising jobs. In the evening, the duty officer brought a pile of mail from the first department. I began by parsing policy documents and letters from allies. Examination of documents and forwarding of orders proceeded quickly until I found a recording
On February 23, 1997 at 22:35 Moscow time, a fire broke out at the Russian orbital station Mir. The so-called "microfire" happened during the duty of flight engineer Alexander Lazutkin, when the backup oxygen production system was turned on. The total fire area was 2 m2.
The Mir station (Fig. 1) had three oxygen supply systems for the crew. The first system was the main one and consisted of two duplicate Elektron units that produced oxygen by hydrolysis of water condensate. One such installation was located in the Kvant-1 module, and the other - in the Kvant-2 module.
The second, backup, system - a solid fuel oxygen generator (THC) - produced oxygen from solid chemical pellets with a certain composition, which, during decomposition at a temperature of about 400 ° C, released oxygen (photo 1).
The TGK could provide the crew with oxygen for as long as the bombs were enough, and was provided for in case of repair of the Elektron installations. One person needs about 600 liters of oxygen per day. Depending on the type of checker, during its combustion, from 420 to 600 liters of oxygen are released.
The third system for supplying gaseous oxygen to the atmosphere of the station from a special cylinder was in the Progress on duty. Her work should have been enough for 23 days for a crew of three.
If necessary, it was also possible to use the oxygen stored at the station for use during spacewalks.
It was decided to switch to a backup system for providing the crew with oxygen using checkers due to the failure of the Elektron installations and the simultaneous presence of cosmonauts of the 22nd and 23rd expeditions at the Mir orbital station. At that moment, six people from two expeditions worked at the station: Valery Korzun, Alexander Kaleri, Vasily Tsibliyev, Alexander Lazutkin, Reinhold Ewald (German cosmonaut) and Jerry Linenger (American astronaut).
Two Soyuz TM ships were docked to the station, which made it possible to evacuate all the people, but one of the ships was cut off by the burning zone. The situation was worsened by the fact that the atmosphere of the station was heavily smoky. Due to circumstances related to the location of the center of gravity, only three crew members out of six present could return on one Soyuz. In the event of an uncontrolled development of the fire, the remaining three crew members would have to be evacuated through fire and smoke to the second Soyuz.
After turning on the backup system, sparks began to fly out of the pipe in which the bomb was smoldering and smoke began to fly out. The fire occurred in the Kvant module on the bulkhead on the starboard side. A white flame, characteristic of an oxygen-enriched environment, stretched through the entire empty space of the module to the port side bulkhead and was accompanied by the release of sparks and molten metal particles. Smoke filled the entire module in less than a minute, visibility dropped, only the outlines of objects could be distinguished.
Damage to some of the station's equipment was caused mainly by high-temperature exposure, and not by open flames. As a result, the installation was destroyed, in which the TGC plug was burning, covering its panel, and the outer layers of the insulation of the electrical cables were melted, while the cables continued to function (Photo 2).
Three foam fire extinguishers were used to extinguish the microfire, and the fire was extinguished in a minute and a half. There was a lot of smoke on board and there was a smell of burning.
The crew reported the emergency to the Mission Control Center. The astronauts were ordered to put on gas masks, which were replaced with respirators a few hours later. Around 36 hours, while the systems of the Mir station cleaned the air, the crew had to wear protective masks so as not to endanger their health.
After the emergency situation that occurred at Mir, a commission was created to investigate the causes of the fire, which included the developers of the TGC and specialists from fire institutes of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. It was found that the start of operation in 1986 of the cassettes of solid fuel oxygen generators was preceded by a full cycle of ground tests and there was not a single failure.
Damage to the cassette case or blockage of the cassette outlets with damp cloth were cited as possible causes of the fire. It was established that there was a single failure of the cassette, it was recommended to use cassettes from 1995-1996.
The final conclusion was to be submitted after the cassette was delivered to the ground and ground analyzes were carried out. The question of the operation of cassettes produced before 1995 was decided to be postponed until the results of additional special tests were received at NPO Nauka.
After the delivery of the damaged TGK cassette to the ground, the working commission to investigate this incident at the ECC of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia appointed a comprehensive fire and technical expertise, during the production of which it was necessary to answer the question about the cause of the fire, as well as consider the organizational and technical aspects related to compliance with the technology manufacturing both the pyrotechnic composition itself and the product as a whole.
As the main probable causes of fire, the versions of damage to the casing of the cassette or closing of the outlet openings of the cassette by a foreign object were initially considered, associated with illegal actions of the crew when working with fire hazardous equipment (a source of increased danger), which resulted in violations of the rules for operating the TGK.
Based judicial practice in fire cases, careless handling of fire or other sources of increased danger that led to the destruction or damage to property, in accordance with part two of Article 168 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, may consist in improper handling of ignition sources near combustible materials, as well as the operation of technical devices with unrepaired defects, leaving unattended devices of increased danger unattended, etc. With regard to this case - in the operation of a faulty TGC.
When analyzing the circumstances of the incident, it turned out that on February 23, one of the checkers installed in the TGC unit worked abnormally, with a flame ejection. According to the testimonies of the crew, the saber burned at a temperature of about 900°C (photo 3).
The process of abnormal combustion began a minute after the start of the TGC, which is carried out using a fuse-heater. To extinguish the generator, the cosmonauts used fire extinguishers, at first in the foam supply mode, but the gas jet coming out of the TGC blew off the foam. Then, switching to the liquid supply mode, they continued extinguishing, and the evaporated moisture filled the atmosphere of the Kvant with steam, which the burning saber tinted in a bright white-red color. As a result, the crew, who was at that time in the base unit, had the feeling that the whole atmosphere of Kvant had flared up.
As part of the production of fire-technical expertise, advanced methods of scanning electron microscopy, X-ray fluorescence and metallographic analysis were applied, which made it possible to establish the design features and elemental composition of the TGK checker, analyze the production technology, compile work program and conduct model experiments aimed at studying the behavior of the checker under various external influences and emergency situations.
Based on the results of the research, it was found that the pyrotechnic composition of TGC meets the requirements of the technical documentation of the manufacturer.
When studying the mechanism of combustion, it was determined that initially it was not the pyrotechnic composition of the TGC that ignited, but the fuse-heater, the destruction of which caused damage to the casing of the generator cassette.
The destruction of the fuse-heater in the TGC cassette was a single case of marriage. In other batches of TGK cassettes, there were no malfunctions in the ignition-heater device (photo 4).
Thus, the results of the examination made it possible to establish the true technical cause of the fire, completely exclude the fault of the crew and develop a set of measures for the further safe operation of solid-fuel oxygen generators on orbital space stations.
The orbital space station "Mir" after the incident was successfully operated for another four years, then (March 23, 2001) was deorbited and flooded in the Pacific Ocean.
Internet resource. URL: http://www.gctc.ru/main.php?id=700
Literature
Zhdanov A.G. Subject, objects and initial data of fire-technical expertise. – M.: VNIIII MVD USSR, 1989.
Nowhere to run. Fire at the space station // Documentary. Production: Prospekt TV, 2006.
