In question, the detection of a leak on board a vessel fixed to the ISS, two months after an incident of the same type.
By Le Figaro with AFP
Posted update
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The Russian space agency Roscosmos announced on Monday February 13 to postpone the launch of the soyuz spacecraft MS-23 supposed to bring three astronauts back to Earth after the discovery of a new leak aboard another spacecraft, docked to the International Space Station (ISS).
On Saturday February 11, Roscosmos indicated in a press release that it had detected “a drop in pressure in the Progress MS-21 cargo ship, which is due to undock from the ISS on February 18” and in “study the reasons». «Temperature and pressure aboard the ISS are at normal levels“, had however reassured the Russian agency, remarks similar to those of NASA published in a separate press release: “The crew (…) is not threatened».
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Launch postponed to March
This Monday, the head of Roscosmos, Yuri Borissov, said that because of this incident, the origin of which is verified by a “emergency committee», «the launch of the unmanned Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft has been postponed to the first decade of March at the latest“. This new incident comes two months after a first leak in a ship docked to the ISS, which was then supposed to bring back to Earth two Russian cosmonauts and their American colleague Frank Rubio.
This leak, which resulted in a brownish stain on the outside of the machine according to a photo released Monday by Roscosmos, had above all caused a “light» Temperature rise according to the Russian agency. Forced to find a solution, the agency has planned to send another ship to recover the trio of astronauts whose mission must be completed in the next few days. It is this alternative vessel whose departure was officially postponed on Monday.
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«Although the outcome of both emergencies is the same, the causes may be different“, Yuri Borissov said Monday about the two leaks that occurred almost in quick succession. The ISS is one of the few fields of cooperation still in progress between Moscow and Washington since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine, launched on February 24, and the Western sanctions that followed.
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