The International Space Station sidestepped a piece of treacherous Russian space junk on October 27 just hours before the planned launch of a supply ship from an island off the eastern shore of Virginia.
NASA said debris from the old, wrecked Russian satellite would have come dangerously close to the orbiting lab – just 400 meters -- if not for the move.
The space station was maneuvered well out of harm's way to keep the outpost and its six inhabitants safe.
NASA’s Mission Control was informed of the space junk during the weekend.
It is wreckage from a Russian Kosmos satellite that was launched in 1993 and collided with an Iridium spacecraft in 2009.
Mission Control said the space station's relocation would not affect the scheduled launch of a commercial supply ship on the evening of October 27 from NASA’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Virginia.