A liquid leak that occurred in mid-December 2022 prevented the exit of two cosmonauts into space. It is located on a Soyuz spacecraft, docked to the ISS. What will happen to this Russian capsule?
Two cosmonauts had to cancel their spacewalk at the last moment, because of a leak. Initially scheduled for the night of December 14 to 15, 2022, the extravehicular outing, scheduled outside the International Space Station (ISS), could not take place. The cause: a coolant leak observed at the level of the Soyuz, one of the space vehicles docked at the ISS. Fortunately, the crew was not endangered. There is currently no question of evacuating the ISS in an emergency either.
The first information about the incident came from NASA. Roscomos, the Russian space agency to which the capsule belongs, ended up giving more details on the situation, relayed on Twitter on December 19 by Katya Pavlushchenko, an Internet user who closely follows space news. The origin of the leak could be the impact of a micrometeorite or space debris on an external cooling radiator, which is on the service module of Soyuz MS-22. It was this ship that carried the manned mission of the same name, launched at the end of September.
For now, the future of this Soyuz vehicle is uncertain. Will it still be able to be used to transport astronauts? The Soyuz MS-22 mission is supposed to last 6 months, which would imply a return of its crew to Earth in March 2023. But we do not know if this trip to Earth can be done with this ship.
2 possible scenarios for the future of the Soyuz, victim of a leak
Analyzes have been carried out to learn more about the situation and the conclusions should not be known before the end of December. 2 options are possible at this stage:
- The capsule can be used for the return of the Soyuz MS-22 team to Earth in March 2023.
- It is impossible, it will then be necessary to send another capsule, the Soyuz MS-23, in automatic mode to the ISS. This spacecraft would replace the Soyuz MS-22 to bring the crew back to Earth.
Two working groups are at work within Roscosmos to analyze the state of the spacecraft and draw up recommendations which will be addressed to specialists and cosmonauts. In addition, several systems, including thrusters, were tested on December 16 without any other malfunctions being noted.
2 days later, the outside of the capsule was scanned, using cameras located on Canadarm 2. This is a manipulator arm, installed on the beam of the ISS (a 100 m long structure which contains the station’s radiators and solar panels). These observations made it possible to identify the area in which the module must have been damaged by an impact.