"American astronaut Michael Foale and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri will seal the airlocks on Saturday morning, January 17, and open them on Sunday night, January 18", said Sergei Puzanov, NASA public relations coordinator.
Pressure inside the ISS has now been brought to normalcy, he said. The crew has made use of the oxygen sticks kept on board of the ISS, as well as the Elektron oxygen regeneration system. In case of need, a regular Progress space ferry, scheduled to blast-off towards the ISS on January 28, can bring an additional set of oxygen sticks.
Not long ago crew commander Michael Foale with the help of a portable ultrasound unit discovered a microcrack in the window drainage hose of the Destiny module, which was the cause of the air pressure fall. The crew promptly eliminated the leak. The damaged hose was removed and a stopper put instead. The connection was sealed.
