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What do you do in space, when the toilet does not work?
For the last twi weeks, the main toilet at the International Space Station (ISS) has not been working.
The crew of three people had to take turns to manually flush the toilet and use extra water- a precious resource in space.
Russian built, the toilet is used by all of the residents on ISS. Luckily, a toilet pump part was rushed from Moscow, just in time for the launch of the space shuttle Discovery.
The toilet trouble at ISS kind of overshadowed the delivery of the second (and main) part of the Japanese lab, named Kibo (hope). With the size of 37 feet (around 13m), it is a huge contribution by Japan and bigger than the NASA and European labs.
Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko replaced the toilet pump. “Let’s start using it”, the Russian Mission control radioed, when the toilet started working again.