On Wednesday evening, audio suggesting an injured crew member aboard the International Space Station (ISS) caused concern. However, NASA confirmed that the audio was part of a training simulation for decompression sickness, mistakenly picked up on the agency’s livestream.
The ISS clarified, “This audio was inadvertently misrouted from an ongoing simulation where crew members and ground teams train for various scenarios in space and is not related to a real emergency. The International Space Station crew members were in their sleep period at the time. All remain healthy and safe, and tomorrow’s spacewalk will start at 8 a.m. EDT as planned.”
SpaceX also commented, explaining that the public heard a test from California. “The crew training in Hawthorne is safe and healthy as is the Dragon spacecraft docked to the @space_station.”
The audio mistake stirred concerns on social media. Users expressed relief upon learning there was no real emergency. One user posted, “That’s a relief super glad that everyone is ok and safe and healthy,” while another commented, “That’s great news! The world was scared for a brief time.”
Astronauts Tracy C. Dyson and Matt Dominick are set for a spacewalk on Thursday to remove a broken radio frequency box from an antenna on the ISS. They will also collect microorganisms from the station’s surface to study their survival and reproduction. The spacewalk will start at 8 a.m. ET and is expected to last about six and a half hours. The event will be broadcast live on NASA’s website and YouTube channel.
