On October 14, the Soyuz M-17 flew off with a new crew to the earth’s Orbit. The crew members included an American Astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts.
On October 14, one American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts flew off to the International Space Station. The crew members flew in the Soyuz MS-17 rocket from the Kazakhstan base.
In addition to that, the rocket will take three hours to reach the International Space Station. The crew will spend 177 days at the International Space Station. Also, they will keep an eye on the Earth’s Orbit through their base.
However, this is the first-ever Rocket to use the ultrafast Rendezvous scheme. The Rocket usually takes half the time to reach the Space Station. This method grew from the last Soyuz spacecraft launched in March 2013.
Soyuz MS-17
The Soyuz MS-17 is a spacecraft that took three crew members to the earth’s Orbit. On October 14, the 145th Soyuz flight took off to the International Space Station. The rocket will take only three hours to reach the destination after the launch.
The Soyuz MS-17 is a series from the Soyuz spacecraft. These spacecraft are designed for the Soviet Space Program by the Korolev design bureau. Currently, there are more than 140 flights that have taken off to the Cosmos.
In addition to that, these spacecraft are the first to use the ultrafast Rendezvous scheme. However, U.S. commercial vehicles are far more spacious than Soyuz spacecraft. But regardless of the narrow space in Soyuz, it is the fastest to reach the ISS.
The space station crew expanded to six people today when the Soyuz crew ship hatch opened at 7:07am ET just a few hours after the Exp 64 crew launched from Kazakhstan. More… https://t.co/9L5DaJFRSa pic.twitter.com/skxgdiKKJH
— International Space Station (@Space_Station) October 14, 2020
About that, the United States is looking forward to organizing more spacious rendezvous flights. In March 2014, Soyuz TMA-12M tried to use the Rendezvous method.
The spacecraft was intended to reach the ISS in six hours, but the two-day Rendezvous plan was reversed due to some internal issues.
The mission
The Soyuz MS-17 launched three crew members named Sergey Nikolayevich Ryzhikov, Dr. Kathleen Hallisey Rubins, and Sergey Vladimirovich Kud-Sverchkov. One of them is an American Astronaut, and the other two are Russian cosmonauts.
This launch will take the crew members to NASA’s commercial crew program. The three crew members will join SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and the SpaceX crew-1.
All the crew members on Expedition-64 will mark the beginning of seven crew operations in ISS.
Expedition means a journey by a group of people with the same purpose of exploration or research. Just like the Expedition-63, the Expedition-64 will also include several spacewalks by the crew members.
In addition to that, the Expedition-64 will also include the replacement of the Nickel hydrogen batteries on the S6 Truss.
All three crew members will have two spacewalks in the mission. The first one will be for routine maintenance, and the second will be for the preparation of the Docking compartment for separation.
In conclusion, the Soyuz MS-17 will reach the International Space Station three hours after the launch. The tasks of the crew members will be to missions of Expedition-64.
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