Mystery Object Near Atlantis Was Ice, NASA Believes

NASA on Tuesday solved the mini-mystery that sprang up when an oblong object was seen floating beside space shuttle Atlantis after last week’s satellite release.

It was a chunk of ice.

The five-foot-long icicle apparently was shaken loose from the outer surface of a shuttle engine nozzle when the astronauts freed the giant communications satellite a few hours after liftoff Friday, said James Hartsfield, a spokesman for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Engineers identified the object after repeatedly viewing a videotape beamed down by the Atlantis crew.

“It appears to be ice. We’re almost certain,” Hartsfield said. Engineers will not be sure until they check the orbiter after it returns to Earth, he said.

Similar objects have floated from the shuttle on previous deployments of satellites. Those, too, probably were ice knocked loose by the jolt from the spring-ejection of the satellites, Hartsfield said.

Aboard the Atlantis, four veteran astronauts said they had never before seen so much haze shrouding Earth.

“I don’t know if that’s because of the recent volcanic eruptions, or the fires or what,” three-time space flier Shannon Lucid said during a televised news conference, referring to the eruptions of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines and the burning oil wells in Kuwait.

Some vistas, though, have been strikingly clear. The astronauts captured a shimmering Mediterranean Sea on videotape Tuesday as well as a detailed view of circular irrigation plots in Saudi Arabia that resembled a honeycomb.