Astronauts Anne McClain from American space agency Nasa, David Saint-Jacques from the Canadian Space Agency and Oleg Kononenko of the Russian space agency Roscosmos left aboard the Russian spacecraft from Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. In August, the space station crew found a hole had been drilled in the Soyuz capsule that caused a brief loss of air pressure before being patched. The next day, the lab’s crew traced the leak to the upper compartment in the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft that carried three crew members to the complex in June. Today’s walk may help officially determine how the hole was made.
The hole in the Russian Soyuz spacecraft attached to the station was spotted on Aug. 30. Sergei Prokopyev said investigators were looking at samples he and crewmate Oleg Kononenko collected during a Dec. 12 spacewalk. Prokopyev and two other astronauts returned to Earth last week after 197-day space station mission.
On August 30, the ISS crew registered a sudden drop in air pressure, prompting emergency measures. Astronauts quickly patched the hole with epoxy on a gauze wipe, and the station’s pressure has been fine ever since. Two Russian cosmonauts have taken samples of their capsule’s exterior in the sixth hour of a spacewalk seeking to resolve the mystery of a small hole found in the craft docked at the International Space Station, a live broadcast by Russian space agency Roscosmos showed early on Wednesday.
Oleg Kononenko and Sergey Prokopyev’s spacewalk, originally expected to last for six hours, began at 1600 GMT on Tuesday. Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Sergey Prokopyev conduct a six-hour spacewalk to investigate the cause of a hole on the Soyuz spacecraft. After more than five hours of a rare broadcast – showing the cosmonauts in space trying to cut through an insulate of the spacecraft with a knife – they uncovered the external part of the hole, originally discovered in the capsule’s internal covering, and took samples of the exterior insulation.
In line with the instructions from the control centre, they also took pictures of the external side of the hole. A tiny hole appeared in a Russian space capsule locked to the ISS on 30th August.
Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin said in September the hole could have been drilled when the capsule was manufactured or in orbit
It has ruled out a manufacturing defect and says it may have been deliberate sabotage. A Russian cosmonaut who explored a mysterious hole in a capsule docked to the International Space Station said Monday that the opening was drilled from inside the spacecraft and Russian law enforcement agencies are investigating what caused it.
A Soyuz spacecraft ferrying Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency, NASA’s Serena Aunon-Chancellor and Sergey Prokopyev of Roscosmos landed safely in Kazakhstan, Russia’s space agency said. Rogozin stopped short of blaming crew members, but the statement has caused friction between Roscosmos and NASA. The current crew is made up of three Americans, two Russians, and a German. The three astronauts aboard the International Space Station watched as as a relief crew ejected from their failed booster rocket last week. Russian spacewalkers have cut samples of material around a mysterious hole in a spacecraft docked on the International Space Station ( ISS ).
The “small but dangerous” hole found in the Soyuz MS-09 craft, docked with the International Space Station, has now been sealed. It’s been reported that according to a top Russian offical the leak was a drill hole that happened during manufacturing or in orbit.
