'Harmful' Leak Shuts U.S. Zone of Space Station

Russia's space agency said, the crew of the International Space Station were forced to evacuate the U.S. section Wednesday after a leak of harmful substances. The Russian Federal Space Agency said on its website, all crew were safe and had moved to the Russian side of the facility. Russia's Interfax news agency said the leaked substance was ammonia, although there was no mention of this in the space agency's statement. The six crew members hung out on the station's Russian side for the day while ground controllers continued to troubleshoot the problem. NASA space station manager Mike Suffredini said during a televised update, operations could start returning to normal by Wednesday night. The alarm was raised at 4 a.m. ET, when Mission Control saw pressure changes that could have been caused by an internal leak in the station's coolant system, which uses water on an inside loop and toxic ammonia on an outside loop. http://nbcnews.to/1AR6raq http://bit.ly/1fJ5yqZ