A big mystery aboard the International Space was solved by NASA on Monday when it claimed to have identified the source of the strange sound emanating from Sunita Williams’ Boeing Starliner spacecraft .
The agency said the the source of the sound was a specific audio configuration between the ISS and the Starliner spacecraft docked there.
The pulsing sound coming from a speaker in Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft heard by astronaut Butch Wilmore aboard the ISS had stopped, a Nasa post said on X.
It was feedback from the speaker and had resulted from an audio configuration between the space station and Starliner.
“The space station audio system is complex, allowing multiple spacecraft and modules to be interconnected, and it is common to experience noise and feedback. The crew is asked to contact mission control when they hear sounds originating in the comm system,” read the post.
Wilmore had alerted mission control at the Johnson Space Centre in Houston on August 31 during a routine check.
“There’s a strange noise coming through the speaker... I don’t know what’s making it,” he had radioed.
He had reported that the crew, Starliner or station operations were not technically impacted by the speaker feedback.
The Boeing Starliner is scheduled to undock unscrewed from the ISS by September 6.
Wilmore and Williams were to travel back in the spacecraft just eight days after their June 5 launch upon reaching the ISS.
However, a series of technical snags, including five helium leaks and five manoeuvring thruster failures and a propellant valve that wasn’t closing delayed their departure.
Even after various retests bringing back Wilmore and Williams to earth seems problematic. On August 24, Nasa said it did not have enough confidence to send the two astronauts back on the Boeing spacecraft, which means their stay has been extended for a couple of months more till a safe option is figured out.
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