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MOSCOW – On August 29, disturbing data from a Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft moored at the International Space Station (ISS) reached mission control centers in Houston and Moscow. The shuttle was losing oxygen, the flight operators noted, and the pressure inside the cabins was decreasing. None of the crew members on board – three Americans, two Russians and one German – could provide an explanation.
After a thorough search of the spacecraft, the astronauts found the leak of oxygen to a small hole about 2 millimeters in diameter located in the Russian section of the ship, the orbital compartment thrown before reentry.
Working with ground flight controllers, they covered the hole using heat-resistant tape as a temporary solution. To stabilize the oxygen levels, they connected the shuttle to another spacecraft docked at the station, the Progress 70, according to a statement from NASA.
In the hours that followed, members of the Russian crew followed Moscow's instructions and stopped the hole with a cloth saturated with epoxy. In the process, they noted existing traces of glue inside the hole, according to Russian media. The crew members agreed with the mission control to wait for the seal to harden and take a day to design a longer-term solution.
NASA was quick to make a statement and call for calm. The flight aboard the spacecraft was "tiny" and did not threaten life, the agency said on August 30. The Russian space agency Roscosmos, for its part, convened a commission to investigate the incident and determine its responsibilities.
The news of the incident is quickly spread, the media having speculated on the cause of the oxygen leak. Explanations cited by space industry sources and Russian journalists range from collision with space debris, presumably micrometeorite, to deliberate sabotage by a crewmember.
A photo of the small hole, published by the Russian space agency Roscosmos, appeared to show traces of impact caused by attempts to insert a drill into the hull.
On September 3, the Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported that the hole had been drilled by a worker from Energiya, the company that makes the Soyuz rockets. By noticing the mistake, the employee would have plugged the hole with glue, which explained why it had not been discovered either during the pre-tests or during the first two months of the space mission. .
The MS-09 space shuttle was docked at the ISS since June.
In the hours following the publication of the report, Dmitry Rogozin, president of Roscosmos, appeared before journalists. He stated that the investigators had ruled out the risk of collision with space debris and considered the possibility of sabotage.
"There is clear evidence of falsification of the spaceship hull," Rogozin told reporters. "We are checking if it was done on Earth, but there is another version that we are not neglecting: deliberate interference in space."
The search for the culprit is an "issue of honor" for Energiya, Rogozin added.
In an interview with US television channel ABC aboard the ISS, station commander Drew Feustel clearly rejected the allegations of sabotage.
"I can say unequivocally that the crew has nothing to do with it in orbit," he said.
"We certainly do not want this to happen again," he added. "And I hope that the field teams will do their due diligence in trying to solve this problem because the implications are enormous for the entire space program, not only for us in the United States, but also in Russia and the United States. international level for all partners. "
NASA was reserved in its response.
In her comments to RFE / RL, spokeswoman for the agency, Stephanie Schierholz, said NASA was awaiting the results of the Roscosmos probe.
"We are working closely with our Russian partners to identify the source and the solution," she said, adding that the incident should not be considered as evidence that Russia-US. space cooperation was threatened.
"We have managed to maintain a fruitful relationship through all sorts of things," she added, citing nearly two decades of bilateral cooperation on the ISS.
Roscosmos refused requests for comment until the commission of the agency completed its investigation.
Since relations between Russia and the United States have been at their lowest since the cold war, the space industry has remained one of the few areas where cooperation continues. US astronauts still rely on Russian spacecraft to get to the ISS, an addiction that is expected to end in the coming years.
According to a US government report released in January, the efforts of Space X and Boeing, the two companies that NASA has commissioned to develop US space transportation, have come up against obstacles. Nevertheless, Russia's leading role in space exploration is threatened by aspiring players such as China, India and Japan.
Falling funding and aging equipment since the fall of the Soviet Union compound the difficulties of the Russian space industry. Following a reduction in funding announced by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in March 2016, NASA's annual expenditures are almost equal to Roscosmos' budget for the next ten-year cycle.
The planned reforms for Roscosmos, which was restructured in 2015 as part of the industry's recovery efforts, have been slow to progress. In May 2015, after another round of problem-related rocket failures at Energomash, the state-owned company that manufactures Proton rocket engines, Rogozin spoke of a "systemic crisis" in the space industry. is committed to making the necessary changes.
According to Ivan Moyseyev of the Institute of Space Policy, a Moscow-based think tank, there has been little evidence of this. In a phone interview, Moyseyev ridiculed the idea that a crew member aboard the Soyuz MS-09 would endanger the lives of his colleagues and placed the August 29 discovery in context. broader declining production standards in Roskosmos.
"Steps are not being taken to improve discipline in the production plants, and this has been going on for a long time," he said. "It's a general problem."
In the meantime, everything seems calm aboard the Soyuz MS-09. On September 10, the commander of the shuttle, Sergei Prokopyev, recorded a video of the affected section in which he showed the spectators the hole in the center of the controversy and the substance used to seal it.
"Everything is calm, we live as always, in peace and friendship," he said before signing a broad smile. "Huge cosmic greetings to you all."
With the report of Washington by the correspondent of RFE / RL, Mike Eckel
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