US, Russia space crew aborts mission after booster failure

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By Ryan Gaydos | Fox News | October 11, 2018

An American astronaut and a Russian cosmonaut returned safely to Earth on Thursday after a Russian booster rocket carrying them to the International Space Station failed shortly after launch.

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NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos’ Alexey Ovchinin were in good condition after making an emergency landing in Kazakhstan, NASA officials said.

The pair lifted off in Kazakhstan at around 2:40 p.m. local time from the Russia-leased Baikonur Cosmodrome atop a Soyuz booster rocket.

The pair was set to dock at the space station six hours after launch, but the booster rocket failed minutes after launch.

NASA said Russian space officials informed the agency that the crew was in good condition after making an emergency landing 12 miles east of the city of Dzhezkazgan. Spacecraft returning from the ISS normally land in that region.

Thursday’s mission was set to be Hague’s first, while Ovchinin spent six months on the station in 2016. Hague joined NASA’s astronaut corps in 2013.
 
 
ISS LEAK: NASA astronauts race to fix International Space Station as air pressure PLUMMETS
THE International Space Station’s (ISS) oxygen breach was contained by NASA and Roscosmos astronauts after the space station began losing air pressure yesterday.

By Sebastian Kettley
PUBLISHED: 11:09, Fri, Aug 31, 2018 | UPDATED: 11:24, Fri, Aug 31, 2018


The ISS’ cabin pressure is now “holding steady” after ISS Expedition 56 crew members hunted down a breach in the spacecraft’s hull.

Alarm bells went off in Houston, Texas, and outside of Moscow on Wednesday, August 29, alerting flight control crews of a pressure drop.

But the six ISS astronauts aboard the ISS were not warned of the space station losing oxygen until the following morning.

Both NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) argued the breach was not dangerous enough to wake the astronauts from their slumber.

NASA said the ISS still had enough oxygen to last the crew for weeks but if the breach had not been sealed, it would have drained the ISS of air in just 18 days.

The space agency has now confirmed the breach only caused “a minor reduction of station pressure”.

Yesterday the six astronauts carried out a search in one of the two Russian Soyuz spacecraft modules docked to the orbital laboratory.

A minute breach about 2mm in size, smaller than the fingernail on a little finger, was detected in in the upper section of a Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft.

During a live feed broadcast from the ISS a crew controller on Earth was heard saying German astronaut Alexander Gerst had plugged the hole with his finger.

The voice said: “Right now Alex has got his finger on that hole and I don’t think that’s the best remedy for it.”

The breach has since been sealed by Roscosmos astronaut Sergey Prokopyev.

The Russian astronaut stopped the oxygen leak with a bit of epoxy and cotton gauze after it was first taped over with heat resistant tape.

Flight controllers are now looking into a more permanent patch.

Right now Alex has got his finger on that hole and I don’t think that’s the best remedy for it

Last night NASA said in a statement: “After a morning of investigations, the crew reported that the leak was isolated to a hole about two milimeters in diameter in the orbital compartment, or upper section, of the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft attached to the Rassvet module of the Russian segment of the station.

“Flight controllers at their respective Mission Control centers in Houston and Moscow worked together with the crew to effect a repair option in which Soyuz commander Sergey Prokopyev of Roscosmos used epoxy on a gauze wipe to plug the hole identified as the leak source.

“As the teams were discussing options, flight controllers in Moscow performed a partial increase of the station’s atmosphere using the ISS Progress 70 cargo ship’s oxygen supply.”

Mission flight control officials are now closely monitoring the space station’s system for additional warning signs.

Russia’s space agency will carry out additional analysis for other leaks.

NASA stressed none of the six astronauts were in any real danger fro the leak.

The space agency told its astronauts “no further action was contemplated for the remainder of the day”.

NASA said: “Flight controllers will monitor pressure trends overnight.

“All station systems are stable and the crew is planning to return to its regular schedule of work on Friday.”

Landfall of Hurricane Michael from space
October 10, 2018

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I'm impressed they can emergency land a capsule.  Saw a bunch of simple news stories on that, but not more detail about the emergency landing process.
 
Tried to post a couple of related You Tube videos and when posting the message the videos got deleted from the post.
 
The video that I saw from the landing was mostly a dusty view such that you couldn't see anything anyways. 
 
That said always wondered why the Russian space program used land to land their spacecraft while here in the US NASA always has used water except for the shuttles.
 
Been facinated with this stuff since the 1960's recalling watching Sputnik crossing the Chicago Skyline back then. 
 
Vivid memories...whole neighborhood was outside those nights and I liked being allowed to stay up past my bed time to watch this stuff.
 
Been a member of NSS (National Space Society) for many years now.  Check it out; interesting stuff...
 
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