posted 05-14-2016 12:46 AM
Am I the only one who saw the photo of a micro-meteor strike on one of the windows of the cupola?
Rick Mulheirn Member
Posts: 4167 From: England Registered: Feb 2001
posted 05-14-2016 04:31 AM
No. The report I read suggested the strike was from a flake of paint.
Robert Pearlman Editor
Posts: 42988 From: Houston, TX Registered: Nov 1999
posted 05-14-2016 05:45 AM
The strike does not appear to be new; there were two previous chips to Window 2 first seen in June 2012 and September 2014.
The recent news articles were the result of Tim Peake sharing a photo of the strike in response to questions he received about the threat from micrometeors.
ESA astronaut Tim Peake took this photo from inside Cupola last month, showing a 7 mm-diameter circular chip gouged out by the impact from a tiny piece of space debris, possibly a paint flake or small metal fragment no bigger than a few thousandths of a millimetre across. The background just shows the inky blackness of space.
"I am often asked if the International Space Station is hit by space debris. Yes – this is the chip in one of our Cupola windows, glad it is quadruple glazed!" says Tim.
To cater for such possibilities, the Station is provided with extensive shielding around all vital crew and technical areas, so that minor strikes, like this one, pose no threat.