NASA Unwraps a Special Delivery From the International Space Station

The contents of this box are the first of their kind made in space.

ByABC News
April 7, 2015, 4:46 PM
The unboxing of the first items made in space with a 3D printer can be seen on NASA's website.
The unboxing of the first items made in space with a 3D printer can be seen on NASA's website.
NASA

— -- 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.

PHOTO: NASA’s 3-D printer on the International Space Station built a wrench. The wrench and other parts have been returned to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
NASA’s 3-D printer on the International Space Station built a wrench. The wrench and other parts have been returned to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. To protect the parts, they will remain sealed in bags until testing begins.

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.