Josh Milton and
Brooke Davies
Published June 5, 2026 3:56pm
Updated June 5, 2026 9:11pm
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Previous Page Next PageAstronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) have resumed their normal duties after air leaks were discovered.
The spacefarers who had travelled to the cosmic outpost in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule were told to seek ‘safe haven’ at around 2pm.
Two leaks had been discovered inside the Russian wing of the ISS, the Zvezda, during the pressurisation of the module’s transfer chamber.
The five astronauts – two Americans, one Russian and one French – sheltered while two Russian cosmonauts made repairs.
Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, said that one of the two leaks has been sealed, according to the state-owned Tass news agency
The second potential leak, which does ‘not pose a threat’ to the crew, is located on the conical portion of the transfer chamber.
Five out of seven cosmonauts in the Russian section of the ISS have been told to shelter inside the docked SpaceX Crew Dragon ‘Freedom’ spacecraft (Picture: ISS/NASA/SWNS)
The team told to shelter Jessica Meir, Jack Hathaway, Sophie Adenot, Andrey Fedyaev and Chris Williams.
They threw on their spacesuits so they were ready to undock and return to Earth at a moment’s notice from the SpaceX Crew Dragon ‘Freedom’ capsule.
Sergey Kud‑Sverchkov and Sergey Mikayev remained to patch the holes.
Joseph Zakrzewski, a spokesman at the Nasa Johnson Space Center in Houston, declared the emergency over at about 4pm.
She said that Russian space officials are standing down and ‘are doing measurements only, so the crew aboard Dragon will be exiting the safe haven posture’.
The astronauts can now get back to work, Zakrzewski added.
Roscosmos has paused Friday’s structural repair efforts inside the Zvezda service module transfer tunnel, known as PrK, as more measurements and data is assessed. Given this development, NASA has instructed the crew members inside the Dragon spacecraft to end the safe haven…
— Bethany Stevens (@NASASpox) June 5, 2026
The tunnel in the Russian Zvezda module has suffered air leaks since 2018, releasing 3.7 pounds of atmosphere a day, Nasa said in 2024.
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Some may have been caused by micrometeoroids, a tiny fleck of space rock, or the endless space junk hurtling above your head.
Crew-12 members, Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, NASA astronauts Jack Hathaway, Jessica Meir, and ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot, before launching to the ISS (Picture: Reuters)
Most leaks were plugged up last year but Russian space officials noticed last month a fresh pressure drop in the tunnel, prompting the repair today.
While a leak might not sound like much, in the abyss of space, even a microscopic crack can lead to a catastrophic failure.
Decompression could happen, when everything inside the chamber is violently spat out into space.
What is the International Space Station?
Involves a lot of floating (Picture: Learn With NASA/SWNS)
The International Space Station is humanity’s high-tech home in the sky.
Over the last nearly 30 years, 280 people from 26 countries have worked, floated, struggled to use the toilet, sang David Bowie and gazed back at Earth.
The space station is up there mainly so people can research, well, space, as well as what being far away from Earth and the comforts of gravity does to the human body – and other Earhtly things.
Humanity’s cosmic cradle will likely come to an end in 2030, after findings from the US, Japan, Europe, Canada and Russia run dry.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].
For more stories like this, check our news page.
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