The International Space Station (ISS) is facing a critical situation as a persistent air leak has escalated, prompting NASA to issue emergency precautionary instructions to its astronauts. During preparations by the Russian space agency, Roscosmos, to conduct high-risk repair work on the leak, NASA directed four astronauts of the Crew-12 mission to shelter inside their docked Crew Dragon spacecraft to ensure they could evacuate immediately if the situation worsened. The crew was also instructed to wear their spacesuits in advance to save critical time, as putting on a suit typically takes about 30 minutes.

The leak is located in the transfer tunnel of the Zvezda service module on the Russian side of the station, which contains components dating back to the 1980s. While the leak began in 2019 at a rate of about one pound of air per day, it has significantly worsened, reaching a loss of 1.68 kilograms of air daily by 2024. Although Roscosmos temporarily postponed the risky maintenance at the last minute to evaluate further technical data—allowing astronauts to return to their normal duties—the issue remains one of the most significant safety risks currently facing the ISS.

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Originally intended to operate only until 2015, the aging ISS has outlived its planned lifespan by over a decade, with hundreds of components operating past their expiration dates. To prevent a catastrophic failure, NASA plans to safely decommission the 400-ton space station by 2030. The decommissioning strategy involves allowing the station to naturally decay in orbit before using a specially modified SpaceX Dragon capsule as a space tug to safely guide the remaining structure to a controlled crash in an uninhabited area of the Pacific Ocean.