That is an urban legend, Paul Fisher invented the pen which can write in space or underwater, without any government funding then sold it to NASA. The lauded cheap pencil is a fire hazard from wood shavings and the graphite dust floating in zero G can ruin equipment, which is why the Russians bought several of those pens about 5 years after NASA put them into use.
Now that’s a stupid luxury. And a maintenance nightmare should it ever fail. Reminds me of:
The American government spent millions of dollars engineering a pen that writes in zero gravity. The Russians brought pencils.
Pencil lead is conductive and would leave shards that would float into the controls.
That fable (it’s not real) is for people who don’t think one step past a witty saying.
That is an urban legend, Paul Fisher invented the pen which can write in space or underwater, without any government funding then sold it to NASA. The lauded cheap pencil is a fire hazard from wood shavings and the graphite dust floating in zero G can ruin equipment, which is why the Russians bought several of those pens about 5 years after NASA put them into use.
A Wikipedia article about floors reminds you of a weird lie you heard one time?
Exactly how do you think a bunch of cables fail?
Not really. I live in South Korea and this has never been an issue anywhere I lived/know of.