Close call in space! NASA loses contact with International Space Station for 90 minutes

NASA Mission Control in Houston, Texas, experienced a 90-minute power outage and left the International Space Station (ISS) without communication with ground control on Tuesday. The power outage occurred at 8 a.m. local time and briefly cut contact with the astronauts aboard the ISS.

The Expedition 69 astronauts were not in danger as they quickly used backup power systems to restore communications through Russian means within 20 minutes of the failure.

"We were able to speak to the crew through Russian means about 20 minutes after the failure," said Joel Montalbano, NASA's ISS program manager. "Within about 90 minutes, we were up and running with full command, telemetry, and voice to the International Space Station."

The power outage was due to an upgrade to Johnson Space Center's ground power system, causing an unexpected loss of telemetry, voice communications, and command. "We were doing some upgrades ... to add some reliability to our power systems. We lost power, telemetry, command, and voice for the International Space Station," Montalbano explained.

The Expedition 69 crew consists of NASA astronauts Frank Rubio, Woody Hoburg, and Stephen Bowen, Roscosmos cosmonauts Dmitri Petelin, Andrey Fedyaev, and Commander Sergey Prokopyev, and United Arab Emirates astronaut Sultan Alneyadi.

Power systems were expected to return to normal by the end of the day, and NASA would thoroughly investigate the incident. Despite the current communication problem, the International Space Station is nearing the end of its mission. NASA intends to deorbit and bring the station back to Earth by 2031 and send it to the Pacific Ocean.