NASA Unwraps a Special Delivery From the International Space Station
The contents of this box are the first of their kind made in space.
— -- It's a special delivery that is the first of its kind.
NASA researchers unboxed the special cargo that included the first-ever 3-D printed tools created at the International Space Station.
Protected by plastic bags, the 21 tools were carefully removed from a box by Quincy Bean, the principal investigator for NASA's 3-D printer, including the first-ever space-created wrench.
The 3-D printer was installed in November 2014 with the goal of testing it as an on-demand solution for astronauts who want to print parts and tools without waiting on a cargo resupply mission.
The parts were sent back in February when the SpaceX Dragon returned to Earth. The next step will be testing, as analysts compare the space-printed parts to a control set that were printed on Earth last year to see if there are any differences.
In the future, NASA said it believes the 3-D printing capabilities will come in handy for astronauts traveling into deep space, including a potential future mission to Mars.