Indian astronaut Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla on Thursday praised ISRO engineers for alerting SpaceX about a liquid oxygen leak in the Falcon-9 rocket, which launched his Axiom-4 mission to the International Space Station (ISS) in June.

Asked by NDTV how he thanked ISRO chairman V Narayanan and his team for “saving his life,” Group Captain Shukla said, “It is important because lives are involved, and if somebody makes a mistake, people do lose lives.”

He added, “It really helped for the technical experts from ISRO to be available there and to have those important discussions,” while addressing a press conference alongside Mr Narayanan, backup astronaut Prashanth Balakrishnan Nair, and Union Minister Jitendra Singh.

The mission, originally scheduled for May 29, was delayed multiple times due to the Dragon spacecraft not being fully ready, high winds, and, finally, the liquid oxygen leak detected in the rocket. NDTV was the first media outlet to report ISRO’s involvement. The astronauts, including Shukla, former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Poland’s Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski, and Hungary’s Tibor Kapu, launched on June 25 and returned safely on July 15.

ISRO Chief: SpaceX “lightly handled” the rocket leak

ISRO chairman V Narayanan said SpaceX had probably taken the leak lightly, putting the astronauts’ lives at risk. He explained that the ISRO engineers identified a crack in the oxidiser lines carrying liquid oxygen, which could have been fatal.

“If with the crack the rocket lifts off, with the vibrations, it will give way the moment it lifts off. Once it gives way, it is a catastrophic situation, nothing else,” he said.

Mr Narayanan added, “But for the complete correction, it would have ended in a catastrophic situation. We have saved the lives of four astronauts.”

Before the June 11 lift-off, an eight-second test was carried out to check the engines. “They completed the tests, and when we discussed, they did not open up the results, and only said that the Committees have cleared and we are going ahead with the launch programme,” he said.

He said, “Probably, they thought it was a minor leakage. That is what the understanding was. It was an oxygen sensor that had picked up. Based on the ISRO team’s insistence, a complete correction was done by the SpaceX team.”

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