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Russia’s Roscosmos space agency on Saturday announced new contingency plans for the three crew members of a damaged capsule docked to the International Space Station, saying the American member of the trio would return to Earth in a separate SpaceX craft if they had to evacuate via the next few weeks.
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The Soyuz MS-22 capsule, which serves as a lifeboat for the crew, sprung a coolant leak last month after it was hit by a micrometeoroid – a tiny particle of space rock – which made a small hole and caused the temperature inside to rise.
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Roscosmos and NASA said this week that a new spacecraft, the Soyuz MS-23, will be launched next month to return cosmonauts Sergei Prokopiev and Dmitry Petelin and American astronaut Frank Rubio. But he won’t board the ISS until February 22.
Given that there could be an earlier emergency, Rubio’s seat is being moved from MS-22 to SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft, also bound for the ISS, Roscosmos said Saturday.
“If an emergency evacuation is needed, Francisco Rubio will return to Earth on it (Crew Dragon) and Roscosmos cosmonauts (will return) on Soyuz MS-22,” it said.
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“Descent of two astronauts instead of three will be safer as it will help reduce the temperature and humidity inside Soyuz MS-22.”
The mission was supposed to end in March, but now the plan is to extend it by several months and bring the three men home with MS-23. The latter was due to take on three new crews in March, but will instead launch empty next month to board the ISS.
Four other crew members are currently on the orbiting station — two more from NASA, a third Russian and a Japanese astronaut, who all arrived in October aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule.
Relations between Russia and the United States have been poisoned by Moscow’s incursion into Ukraine, but the two countries continue to work closely together on the ISS, an orbiting laboratory about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth that has been continuously occupied for two decades.
However, Russia has said it plans to abandon the aging project after 2024 and launch its own station. (Reporting by Mark Trevelyan Editing by Tomasz Janovski)
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