Fungus fracas delays opening of robot cargo ship ‘Albert Einstein’

After a flawless launch and flight to the International Space Station by the European Space Agency's robotic cargo ship 'Albert Einstein', the crew of the station was forced to delay opening it due to concerns about mold.

Although the ship arrived at the station on Saturday and was due to be opened on Monday, NASA reported that "Russian management expressed concerns with suspected microbial growth on some of the cargo bags in the vehicle and therefore hatch opening scheduled for today was delayed while the coordination on microbial remediation was determined. The current plan is to open the ATV hatch early in the crew morning on Tuesday and have the crew wipe the suspected bags with Fungistat prior to transferring to ISS."

Normally something like mold isn't a really big deal, at least down here on Earth, but up in space, in a closed environment roughly equivalent to a 5-bedroom house, the crew has to be very careful about what they let on board the station. Scientists already know that humans in space have the deck stacked against them when it comes to microorganisms. Our immune system gets weaker, while the microorganisms not only get stronger, but are also more able to resist antibiotics.

It's not just a concern for the crew, but also the station itself. Back in 1998, astronauts visiting the Russian space station Mir collected samples, looking for mold and other microbes, and actually found free-floating globules of dirty water behind several service panels, including one that had reached an impressive size. "According to the astronauts' eyewitness reports, the globule was nearly the size of a basketball," said Johnson Space Center health scientist C. Mark Ott, according to Science@NASA. That kind of water accumulation can cause problems with the station's electrical systems, and they're breeding grounds for microbes (which are likely what the water started to accumulate on in the first place, similar to 'cloud condensation nuclei').

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While there's no confirmation as to whether there actually were any stowaways on the ship (and it may have been just a case of the ESA crew not documenting the cleaning to the Russians' satisfaction), according to NBC News space analyst James Oberg, "It's a well-established principle of spaceflight safety that, under uncertainty, you don't 'assume the best,' you make sure the worst cannot be true. And if you're not sure you decontaminated these items to rigorous standards, then you do it again, to make sure."

The cargo ship was 'open for business' early Tuesday morning, and the crew recorded this video of their first entry into the spacecraft:

Once 'Albert Einstein' is unloaded, it will be filled with trash from the station and then released to burn up on re-entry.

(Image courtesy: European Space Agency)

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