Russia to return ISS crew on backup rocket after capsule leak - Reuters

MOSCOW, Jan 11 (Reuters) - Russia said connected Wednesday it would motorboat different Soyuz rocket connected Feb. 20 to bring location 2 cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut from the International Space Station aft their archetypal capsule sprang a coolant leak past month.

The leak came from a tiny puncture - little than 1 millimetre wide - connected the outer cooling strategy of the Soyuz MS-22 capsule, 1 of 2 instrumentality capsules docked to the ISS that tin bring unit members home.

Russia says the unit volition present instrumentality connected Soyuz MS-23, portion the damaged Soyuz MS-22 capsule volition beryllium brought backmost to Earth empty.

"Having analysed the information of the spacecraft, thermal calculations and method documentation, it has been concluded that the MS-22 indispensable beryllium landed without a unit connected board," Yuri Borisov, the caput of Russian abstraction bureau Roscosmos, said.

If determination is an exigency successful the meantime, the bureau volition look astatine whether the spacecraft tin beryllium utilized to rescue the crew, helium added.

"The expedition of Sergey Prokopyev, Dmitry Petelin and Francisco Rubio to the ISS is being extended. They volition instrumentality to Earth connected Soyuz MS-23," Roskosmos said.

The MS-23 motorboat had earlier been planned for mid-March, but volition alternatively depart from the Baikonur cosmodrome arsenic an unmanned rescue mission.

The incidental has disrupted Russia's ISS activities, forcing its cosmonauts to telephone disconnected spacewalks arsenic officials absorption connected the leaky capsule, which serves arsenic a lifeboat for the crew. Russia says the leak whitethorn person been caused by a meteoroid impact.

The leak is besides a occupation for NASA. The U.S. bureau said past period it was exploring whether SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft could connection an alternate thrust location for immoderate ISS unit members, successful lawsuit Russia was incapable to motorboat different Soyuz.

Reporting by Mark Trevelyan and Caleb Davis; editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Gareth Jones

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