Chemical Leak at Space Station, NASA on Alert

Confusion and chaos prevailed throughout as astronauts at the International Space Station (ISS) reported a “smoke like smell” from one of the units they were working on. The report comes on the heels of a visit by the shuttle “Soyuz” and the departure of “Atlantis”.

The three astronauts, Russian Pavel Vinogradov, American Jeff Williams and German Thomas Reiter first reported "an odor that was not normal." However the initial scare of fire was soon dispelled and the smell is being attributed to potassium hydroxide, which might have leaked from an oxygen-generating device called the Elektron. The compound is corrosive in nature and can cause serious burns and can be harmful if inhaled.

Elektron, Russian oxygen generating system works by splitting water into oxygen for breathing and hydrogen that is dumped overboard. The system has given the space station headaches before. It had operated on-and-off for months before breaking down last spring. In June, the crew tried to reactivate it, with mixed results. When it is not functioning properly, astronauts have alternative ways of replenishing the oxygen in the station’s air: they can burn special oxygen-producing candles or tap the large oxygen storage tanks on board.

NASA had declared a state of station emergency and summoned the astronauts to wear their protective gear. Because the station's emergency system was activated, the ventilation system was shut down, but ground operations were working to get it back up.

The crew donned surgical gloves and masks; they will use charcoal to clean up the odor from the $100 billion station. The need to use oxygen masks didn’t arrive.

Evidently things are getting back to normal as a fire has been ruled out. The situation is now under control. “Subsequent air checks indicated levels of the chemical irritant were well below levels of concern and the ventilation system is gradually being restarted”, Mike Suffredini, the station's program director said. "Things look very stable on board, we don't exactly know the nature of the spill ... but the crew is doing well,"he commented further. He emphasized further that it was not a life threatening material.

Soyuz touches down on Wednesday on ISS with its crew and first female tourist to space.

Mission Control praised Atlantis for completing its main mission of adding a 17 1/2-ton addition, including a pair of 115-foot-long solar wings, to the space station. Earlier on Monday the Atlantis crew started an inspection before the journey back home, to sense any damage to the shuttle. Pilot Chris Ferguson and astronauts Dan Burbank and Steve MacLean used a robotic arm to scan the heat shield on the nose and wings of the shuttle. Ironically it was the dysfunction of the heat shield that caused Columbia to go up in flames as it entered the earth’s atmosphere, claiming lives of seven astronauts.