ISS International Space Station

Russian Progress capsule crashes

A Russian Progress spacecraft has crashed in eastern Russia.

A Russian Soyuz-U rocket launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan successfully flew for 325sec before a "violation of propulsion", according to the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roskosmos). Preliminary reports indicate a premature shutdown of the rocket's third stage RD-0110 engine.

News reports indicate that that the Progress has crashed in sparsely-populated Siberia.

The Progress spacecraft was scheduled to bring 3.5t of supplies to the International Space Station. It is the first launch to the ISS since the Space Shuttle's final flight in July.

Soyuz has launched more than 1,700 times over its long career, according to Ascend's SpaceTrak, making it the most frequently-used booster system. Soyuz has suffered a total of 88 failures since its first launch in 1957, with only one occurring within the past 10 years.

ISS: la Russie annonce les dates de décollage de quatre vaisseaux spatiaux

Deux cargos russes Progress décolleront à destination de la Station spatiale internationale (ISS) le 30 octobre 2011 et le 26 janvier 2012 et deux vaisseaux habités Soyouz pour le 12 novembre et le 20 décembre, a annoncé mardi l'Agence fédérale spatiale russe (Roskosmos).

"Des vaisseaux de transport Progress seront lancés le 30 octobre 2011 et le 26 janvier 2012 et des vaisseaux pilotés Soyouz le 12 novembre et le 20 décembre, selon un nouveau calendrier des tirs approuvé compte tenu des résultats de l'enquête sur l'accident du cargo Progress M-12M", a indiqué l'agence dans un communiqué.

Le 24 août dernier, un lanceur russe Soyouz-U n'a pas réussi à placer sur orbite le cargo Progress M-12M en raison de la panne du moteur du troisième étage du lanceur. Le cargo transportait de l'eau, des denrées alimentaires et du carburant pour l'ISS. L'agence Roskosmos a indiqué que cet accident ne poserait pas de problèmes à l'équipage de l'ISS qui possède des réserves suffisantes, mais entraînerait une modification du calendrier des travaux en orbite.

The Brightness of the Sun

The bright sun, a portion of the International Space Station and Earth's horizon are featured in this image photographed during the STS-134 mission's fourth spacewalk in May 2011. The image was taken using a fish-eye lens attached to an electronic still camera.

Expedition 30 Cosmonauts Perform Spacewalk

This image of Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Anton Shkaplerov, both Expedition 30 flight engineers, was taken during a spacewalk on Thursday, Feb. 16, 2012. During the six-hour, 15-minute spacewalk, Kononenko and Shkaplerov moved the Strela-1 crane from the Pirs Docking Compartment in preparation for replacing it in 2012 with a new laboratory and docking module. The duo used another boom, the Strela-2, to move the hand-operated crane to the Poisk module for future assembly and maintenance work. Both telescoping booms extend like fishing rods and are used to move massive components outside the station. On the exterior of the Poisk Mini-Research Module 2, they also installed the Vinoslivost Materials Sample Experiment, which will investigate the influence of space on the mechanical properties of the materials. The spacewalkers also collected a test sample from underneath the insulation on the Zvezda Service Module to search for any signs of living organisms. Both spacewalkers wore Russian Orlan spacesuits bearing blue stripes and equipped with NASA helmet cameras.