NASA is back in contact with the International Space Station after a communications outage of almost three hours Tuesday. <\/p>\n
Communications were restored at 12:34 p.m. ET, NASA reported on Twitter. <\/p>\n
NASA lost contact with the space station at 9:45 a.m. ET, while the software on the stations flight computers was being updated remotely from the ground by flight controllers in Houston, Texas, NASA reported in a release. <\/p>\n
The outage is being blamed on a malfunction of the stations data relay systems, which caused the space stations main computer to bar communication with the satellites that allow it to communicate with NASA. <\/p>\n
Communication was briefly restored around 11 a.m. ET as the space station flew over Russian ground stations. At that time, NASA told the space stations crew to connect a backup computer to restore communications. <\/p>\n
The U.S. space agency said the stations current commander, Kevin Ford, reported that the station was fine and the six astronauts on board were doing well. <\/p>\n
Canadian Chris Hadfield is currently among the crew of the space station. Earlier in the morning, Hadfield had sent out a tweet indicating that the space stations main computers were getting a software upgrade. <\/p>\n
Nothing could possibly go wrong, he added at the time. <\/p>\n
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Continue reading here: NASA is back in contact with the International Space Station after a communications outage of almost three hours Tuesday. Continue reading
\nSpace station restores communication with Earth<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"