Astronauts have lucky escape as rocket malfunctions after launch

[Dos_Box]

It's nice to see that safety mechanisms work! - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45822845

Still no news on the condition of the two on board but apparently they were communicating fine on the decent.

Rescue teams are still being shown as en-route.

[FishCustard]

That's a little worrying, as the Soyuz is the only way of getting people to the ISS until they approve whatever SpaceX has come up with (the Dragon something or other?).

[Dos_Box]

That's a little worrying, as the Soyuz is the only way of getting people to the ISS until they approve whatever SpaceX has come up with (the Dragon something or other?).

 

Given the frequency they go up it shouldn't take much to get another ready in a short time, however as the two on board were due to be crew for the ISS I doubt they will be in any fit state to go back up any time soon.

[tg12]

An exceptionally rare event! I think I saw that this may be only the second crewed launch ever to end up with an abort like this. Soyuz particularly has had a good track record, although recent events aren't great with this and the hole in MS-09 causing the leak. There's whispers around that Roscosmos is starting to struggle.

 

Commercial Crew launches are close to reality but I don't think NASA will want to take the risks of rushing them through in order to provide service to the ISS as soon as possible. Both SpaceX and Boeing need to do an unmanned launch to the station first to certify them for a crewed test. The first Dragon should be ready to go, as it's being slated for first launch towards the end of the year, but I've heard the Boeing design is a bit behind now.

 

The main concern currently is what to do about the crew still up there. Soyuz ships have a limited life in orbit, so realistically, the one currently up there can only go until about December. They could either leave the ISS unmanned if there are no crew launches by then, or potentially send up a new Soyuz unmanned, which could potentially end up having the same issues if there is a quality control issue here, but at least wouldn't have crew put at risk.

 

Launch is still by far the greatest risk in terms of spaceflight. An interesting tidbit from seeing Chris Hadfield speak last week, he talked about Peggy Whitson, the USA's currently most experienced astronaut at around 666 days in space and three missions. At 58 years old, over 50% of the risk to her life that she has experienced has come from those three launches, which in total is about 27 minutes.

[Andrew_C]

I doubt they will be in any fit state to go back up any time soon.

Certainly not until they have visited the laundry...

[Dos_Box]

Certainly not until they have visited the laundry...

I can only imagine their sense of relief when the cutes opened.