A Russian unmanned rocket carrying vital supplies to the International Space Station (ISS) suffered a serious “malfunction” after liftoff, and the cargo plane will no longer be able to autonomously dock to the station, NASA has warned.
As a result, the cosmonauts (Russian cosmonauts) may have to use a “backup system” to remotely dock the stricken ship to the ISS while orbiting Earth.
Article continues below
you may like
Progress 94, carrying about 5,500 pounds (2,500 kilograms) of food, water, fuel, oxygen, hardware, scientific equipment, and medical supplies, was scheduled to automatically dock with the ISS around 9:30 a.m. ET on Tuesday (March 24). However, this strategy will not be as easy as expected.
About 40 minutes after liftoff, NASA revealed that one of the Progress spacecraft’s antennas did not deploy properly after separating from the Soyuz rocket. This antenna plays a key role in helping the robotic cargo ship dock into Russia’s Poisk module airlock, meaning it is no longer possible to attempt a docking without human involvement.
“Troubleshooting will continue and if the antenna cannot be deployed, Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergei Kud Sverchkov will manually pilot the spacecraft via backup systems for rendezvous and docking with the space station,” a NASA representative wrote to X.
Kudo Sverchkov, along with fellow cosmonaut Sergei Mikayev and NASA astronaut Christopher Williams, is part of Expedition 73/74 crew and has been on the ISS since Thanksgiving. The veteran astronaut spent six months in space from October 2020 to March 2021, serving as both flight engineer and commander on the ISS mission.
It is unclear exactly what the backup system is or how it operates.
Despite the setback, “all other systems are working as designed,” and the docking attempt will continue as planned, with fixed antennas in place or Kudo Sverchkov at the controls, NASA officials wrote.
The docking attempt can be viewed on a NASA livestream beginning at approximately 8:45 a.m. EDT on Tuesday.
What to read next
recurring problem
This is not the first setback for the Progress 94 mission. The cargo ship was originally scheduled to launch in mid-December 2025. However, the launch was postponed due to severe damage to site 31 of the launch pad after the Expedition 73/74 crew launch.
It’s unclear exactly what happened to Russia’s only operational launch pad. Rumors initially suggested that the service platform had not been properly secured before takeoff, causing it to fall into a “flame trench” beneath the pad. However, Russia announced earlier this month that the damage had been fully repaired.
Nor is this the only recent accident involving the ISS. The setback comes about two months after four astronauts (NASA’s Mike Finke and Zena Cardman, Japan’s Kimiya Yui, and Russia’s Oleg Platonov) were sent home from the ISS earlier than planned after Finke experienced an undisclosed medical emergency in space. This was the first medical evacuation in the department’s 26-year history.
Before that, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunni Williams were stranded on the ISS for nine months from 2024 to 2025. Their initial two-week mission was extended when a defective return capsule was sent back to Earth without them.
Elsewhere in low Earth orbit, China’s Tiangong space station has also experienced its own share of drama recently. Last November, several Chinese astronauts were left stranded in space for weeks after their return capsule was hit by debris believed to be space junk, causing the launch of an unmanned “lifeboat” rocket.
And recently, NASA’s Artemis II mission, which will return humans to the moon for the first time since 1972, has been repeatedly delayed due to multiple mechanical problems. After the rocket was returned to the launch pad last week, NASA is now targeting a launch next month.
Source link
