Astronaut red-faced after $100,000 space blunder

Nov 20 2008 by Andy Richards, Birmingham Mail

THE astronaut who lost her tool bag on a spacewalk admitted that she made a mistake by not checking to see if the sack was tied down, and said she’s still embarrassed over the whole thing.

Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper said it was “very disheartening” to lose her bag full of tools. She was trying to clean up grease that had oozed out of a grease gun in the backpack-size bag, when it and everything in it floated away on Tuesday.

The bag was one of the largest items ever lost by a spacewalking astronaut. NASA put the price tag of the tool bag at 100,000 US dollars.