Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
All 10 questions with answers and explanations. Play this daily
Q 01What did investigators conclude made the 2 mm hole found in Soyuz MS-09 at the ISS?
A drill
A drill made the hole, and a sealant patch applied on the ground apparently gave way after two months in orbit, exposing the leak to the crew.
Q 02What were the improvised straps spacewalkers used to repair a torn ISS solar array nicknamed?
Cufflinks
Scott Parazynski, perched on the end of a robotic boom, fitted five cufflinks to the torn array, straps that took strain off a snagged hinge.
Q 03What failure sent Doug Wheelock and Tracy Caldwell Dyson on emergency spacewalks to fix the ISS cooling system?
Ammonia pump malfunction
An ammonia pump malfunction in 2010 disabled half the station's cooling, and swapping out the failed 780-pound pump module took three spacewalks.
Q 04Which Russian cargo spacecraft was lost when its rocket's third stage failed on the way to the ISS?
Progress
Progress M-12M came down in Russia's Altai Republic in 2011, the first time a Progress had failed to deliver cargo since the series was introduced in 1978.
Q 05Which newly docked Russian module fired its thrusters by mistake and sent the ISS spinning one and a half turns?
Nauka
Nauka's software glitch turned the station about 540 degrees, leaving it upside down, before its engines were disabled and control was regained.
Q 06What leaked into Luca Parmitano's helmet during his aborted spacewalk outside the ISS?
Water
Water from his suit's cooling system backed up into the helmet, and as the Sun set he found his way back to the airlock by following his safety cable.
Q 07What did investigators find caused the Soyuz booster failure that aborted Hague and Ovchinin's ISS flight?
A bent separation sensor
A bent separation sensor, damaged during assembly at Baikonur, kept a side booster from separating cleanly; Hague and Ovchinin landed safely and flew to the station together in March 2019.
Q 08How did Starliner astronauts Wilmore and Williams finally return to Earth?
Aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon
They came home aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon with Crew-9 in March 2025, after NASA decided to bring Starliner back without them.
Q 09How did cosmonauts Yurchikhin and Kotov revive the ISS's crashed Russian guidance computers?
Bypassing a bad power switch
Bypassing a bad power switch with external cabling revived four computer channels, then the last two; engineers suspected the newly installed S4 solar array had upset the power grid.
Q 10What broken ISS hardware did shuttle Discovery haul up an urgent spare part for?
The toilet
The toilet in the Russian-built Zvezda module had broken down, and the crew repaired it on the mission's fifth day with parts Discovery carried in a mid-deck locker.