Following the discovery of the debris, NASA reports that the nine astronauts residing on the space station were instructed to seek refuge in their individual spacecraft.
In their first crewed test flight on the station, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunni Williams climbed into their Starliner spacecraft, a Boeing-built capsule that has been docked since June 6.
In March, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule carried three additional US astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut to the space station.
In September of last year, the Russian Soyuz capsule carrying the six American astronauts arrived at their destination.
About an hour later, the astronauts left their spacecraft and went back to their regular tasks aboard the station, according to NASA.
The reason behind the Russian Earth monitoring satellite’s breakdown, which was deemed fatal in 2022, was not immediately known.
Experts believed it was improbable that Russia used a ground-based anti-satellite missile to bring it down.
Harvard astronomer Jonathan McDowell commented, “I find it hard to believe they would use such a big satellite as an ASAT target.” “But, with the Russians these days, who knows?”
When Russia used a missile fired from its Plesetsk rocket base to strike one of its dead satellites in orbit in 2021, it provoked harsh condemnation.
