Station Crew Hears Another 'Funny' Noise

Station Crew Hears Another 'Funny' Noise



A friend was just listening to NASA TV (11:15 AM EST) and Kaleri reported
another noise
- just like the November one -- from the same area of the Zvezda module's
instrument compartment just as the DPC (daily planning conference) was
underway
this morning.... Moscow-TsUP reckoned it could be a "system" causing the
noise.

A flight director told me two months ago they suspected the first noise may
have been
thermal buckling ("tin-canning") on the outer skin caused by sunlight
concentrated
in reflections off solar power panels. It also used to happen on Skylab
(1973-1974).

TV cameras on the station arm looked at this area but saw it only
at an angle from far off, and nothing unusual showed up. Plans to inspect
the area with close-up eyeballs during the spacewalk in Feb were
cancelled when one spacesuit malfunctioned.

One 'funny' is an anomaly. Two is a pattern. We'll see what develops.

It could be entirely normal and nothing to worry about. But in the
post-Columbia era, NASA must PROVE this, not just 'assume' it.

Jim Oberg