NASA astronaut Frank Rubio and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitri Petelin are faced with extending their stay aboard the International Space Station by several months and will require a new ride home after their Russian MS-22 Soyuz spacecraft sprang a leak last month.
The trio was supposed to use that spacecraft to return to Earth in March. Wednesday, NASA and Russian space officials unveiled a plan to launch an empty Soyuz capsule to the ISS to ferry them back instead. That means the three men will spend several more months at the ISS.
During a briefing with reporters, NASA’s Joel Montalbano, manager of the International Space Station program, said that NASA is not considering the move-up in the MS-23 Soyuz launch a rescue mission. “We’re not calling it a rescue Soyuz,” said Montalbano. “Right now, the crew is safe onboard the space station.”
“I’m calling it a replacement Soyuz,” he said. “There’s no immediate need for the crew to come home today.”
Initially set to fly the next rotation of Russian cosmonauts to the station in mid-March, the MS-23 Soyuz spacecraft is now being repurposed to launch as an empty lifeboat to ferry the MS-22 crew home later this year. The empty spacecraft is set to launch from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Feb. 20.
Flying the MS-23 crew up as previously planned would have left the ISS in the same situation, with more people on board than available seats on functioning spacecraft to evacuate back to Earth in the unlikely event of a catastrophe.
That means that Rubio, Prokopyev, and Petelin will need to extend their space stay until September or until Roscosmos can build another Soyuz spacecraft to launch its next rotation of crew members, which are now stuck grounded for longer than anticipated.
According to Montalbano, the space station remains safe, and the crew members are healthy enough to remain in space while this plan plays out.
“They’re prepared to stay until the September launch date, if that’s the case,” said Montalbano. “If that launch date moves up earlier, then they’re prepared to come home earlier.”
Jokingly, he said: “I may have to find some more ice cream to reward them.”
“The awesome thing about our crews are they’re willing to help wherever we ask,” he said. “They are ready to go with whatever decision that we give them.”
