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Credit: RSC Energia
The Russian Space Agency Roscosmos will launch a new cargo on a fast flight to the International Space Station today (9 July) and you will be able to look- Live online The mission will set a new speed record for space station journeys: it is supposed to take less than 4 hours, says NASA
A Soyuz rocket is expected to launch the Progress spacecraft 70 unstuck from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 5:51 pm EDT (2151 GMT) to deliver nearly 3 tons of supplies to the crew of the space station. The launch of NASA's broadcast will begin at 17:30. EDT (9:30 pm GMT) and you can watch it live here, with the kind permission of NASA TV.
If all goes well, the Progress 70 spacecraft will dock in a Russian port at 9:39 pm. EDT (0139 July 10th GMT). This would be the fastest trip yet for a mission to the space station. The Progress spacecraft (and the Soyuz pods carrying crew members) initially took two days to reach the station before Roscosmos reduced the trip to 6 hours in 2013. Progress 70 should make the trip a little more 3.5 hours. [Russia’s Progress Cargo Ships Explained (Infographic)]
"The trip of less than four hours will demonstrate an accelerated capability that could be used in future Russian cargo and crew launches," NASA officials said in a statement.
Russia's third attempt to carry out an ultra-fast mission to the space station The first attempt was made in October 2017 with the Progress 68 satellite, but a last-minute delay forced Roscosmos to switch to Old flight profile of 2 days due to orbital mechanics. A second attempt at the beginning of the year in February reached the same hurdle with Progress 69: A last minute glitch forced Roscosmos to stop the launch a minute before takeoff.
The cargo ships of Russia Progress have been keeping the space station supplied since 2000, when the first crew sits in the orbiting laboratory. spaceship, but can not transport people.
Progress spacecraft are disposable vehicles that are packaged with waste and unnecessary items and intentionally burned into the earth 's atmosphere at the end of the mission. Progress 70 will remain connected to the space station until January 2019, when it will be scrapped, NASA officials said.
Russia's Progress vehicles are not the only robotic cargo ships to have supplied the space station. Private cargo ships such as SpaceX's Dragon vehicles and the Cygnus spacecraft built by Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems are delivering supplies to the station for NASA. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency sends its own H-2 transfer vehicles on a delivery mission. The European Space Agency launched five of its huge automated transfer vehicles at the station between 2008 and 2014.
Send an email to Tariq Malik at [email protected] or follow him @tariqjmalik . Follow us @Spacedotcom Facebook and Google+ . Original article on Space.com
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