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Renowned cosmonaut
Sergei Krikalev, Roscosmos Executive Director for Manned Flights, speaks to the reporters in Moscow about
the Soyuz failure. Credit: Roscosmos
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Ken Kremer -- SpaceUpClose.com -- 18 October 2018
CAPE CANAVERAL,
FL – The emergency abort of the Soyuz crew launch with two crewmembers strapped inside on Oct. 11 was apparently caused by
a failure in the booster separation mechanism for the first two stages of the
Soyuz FG rocket two minutes after blastoff from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan–
according to an investigation by Roscosmos, the Russian space agency responsible
and equivalent to NASA.
The separation
failure resulted in a collision of one of the first stage strap boosters with
the second stage which then triggered a harrowing emergency separation of the Soyuz
MS-10 crew capsule from the Soyuz FG carrier rocket.
"There
are no final versions but the primary cause is understandable and is related to
the collision of a side element making part of the first stage. A collision
occurred during the separation of the first and second stages," said Sergei
Krikalev, Russias most famous cosmonaut now retired and currently serving as Roscosmos
Executive Director for Manned Flights, as reported by the Russian news agency TASS.
Altogether there are four strap on boosters comprising the
first stage which are attached to the second stage. Three of the strap ons clearly
separated - as seen in photos taken at the time by NASA photographer Bill Ingalls
and others. The fourth was not visible in Ingalls’s photo released by NASA and
included herein.
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The Soyuz MS-10
spacecraft is launched with Expedition 57 Flight Engineer Nick Hague of NASA
and Flight Engineer Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2018 at
the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. During the Soyuz spacecraft's climb to
orbit, an anomaly occurred, resulting in an abort downrange. The crew was
quickly recovered and is in good condition. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)
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Why the separation failure happened is the focus of the investigation which could have been caused by a malfunction of the hardware mechanisms, computer commands or other factors yet to be determined.
The automatic
abort system of the extremely reliable Soyuz booster then kicked in exactly as
it was designed to in a split second – and saved the lives of Soyuz MS-10 crew launch comprising NASA astronaut
Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin who planned to spend 6 months aboard
the International Space Station as members of the Expedition 57 crew.
This demonstrated
the robustness of the Soyuz rocket abort preparations and planning.
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The Soyuz MS-10
spacecraft is launched with Expedition 57 Flight Engineer Nick Hague of NASA
and Flight Engineer Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2018 at
the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. During the Soyuz spacecraft's climb to
orbit, an anomaly occurred, resulting in an abort downrange. The crew was
quickly recovered and is in good condition. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)
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Hague and Ovchinin
soft landed safely after a ballistic descent and in good health back on Earth
about 34 minutes after liftoff. They flew to about
50 km altitude followed by a parachute assisted ballistic trajectory touchdown
in remote Kazakhstan some 250 miles (400 km) downrange and east of the Baikonur launch site.
They briefly experienced
G-forces up to about 6 to 7 G’s as well as a few moments of weightlessness
during the initial descent along the ballistic descent trajectory.
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| Soyuz MS-10 capsule after emergency landing on Oct.
11, 2018 following aborted launch of Russian-American crew to the ISS from
Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan. © Southern Military
District's press service/TASS |
The second stage
apparently disintegrated shortly after the anomaly occurred about 119 seconds after liftoff and about a
second after first stage separation.
The launch abort tower
bolted on top of the Soyuz MS-10 capsule had also just been jettisoned as
planned during a normal liftoff and announced during the live launch broadcast
from Roscosmos and NASA.
"A deviation from
the standard trajectory occurred and apparently the lower part of the second
stage disintegrated. The rocket stopped its normal flight and after that the
automatic system did its work."
A live video feed from
inside the capsule showed Hague and Ovchinin
shaking back and forth at the moment of the mishap.
“An element of the
booster’s first stage collided with the second stage,” Krikalev said.
"This could have
been caused by the failure of the system of the normal separation, which should
have been activated. We will analyze the causes in detail."
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Launch
of Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the
International Space Station at 4:40 a.m. EDT, October 11 (2:40 p.m. Baikonur
time) carrying American astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexey
Ovchinin. Credit: Sergei Savostyanov/TASS
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The Soyuz capsule made a ballistic emergency landing in a remote area in Kazakhstan east of the town of Dzhezkazgan, a staging area for crews for normal landings located 250 miles (400 km) from the Baikonur launch site.
Hague and Ovchinin were on their way to start a fast four orbit trip to the ISS to start Expedition 57 and join the crew of three aboard: Expedition 57 Commander Alexander Gerst of ESA (European Space Agency), NASA Flight Engineer Serena Auñón-Chancellor and Roscosmos Flight Engineer Sergey Prokopyev.
Hague and Ovchinin first went back to Moscow mission control the next day. Hague then departed and arrived back in Houston a day later.
In interviews Hague complemented the robustness of the Soyuz system.
“The incident only helped to solidify my appreciation for how robust that system is," said Hague.
"There is a launch abort system that protects me continuously from about an hour before the launch until I’m in orbit. And at any moment in there that we could have a failure, it’s going to protect me. This was just a great example of those failsafe systems stepping in and doing the job."
This was the first failure of the Soyuz rocket in 35 years when a rocket exploded on the launch pad at Baikonur and the crew escaped via the launch abort rocket on top of the capsule.
Since the 1960s there have been more than 160 unmanned and manned launches of the Soyuz spacecraft.
Roscosmos immediately established a state commission to investigate the failure.
Wreckage has been found in the steppes of Kazakhstan by investigators and is being analyzed for clues and answers.
"The panel of inquiry got down to work Oct 11. The results are expected after October 20. The first components found in Kazakhstan’s steppe will help find out what happened. The necessary measures will be taken afterwards and flights will be continued," Krikalev said.
The Soyuz rocket is grounded until a cause is determined and corrective actions are implemented.
“All rockets of this class will be authorized for use again only when the causes of the failure were clear.”
Since the forced shutdown of NASA’s space shuttles in 2011, the US has been totally reliant on the Russian Soyuz for astronaut trips to the ISS.
NASA is developing new commercial crew capsules to ferry crews to the ISS with SpaceX and Boeing- but they have been repeatedly delayed by technical and funding issues.
The impact of the launch failure on future Soyuz launches and cargo ship launches is still at this time.
Thus at the moment there is no way to send new replacement crews to the ISS and NASA’s commercial crew capsules will not be ready for launch until mid-2019 or later – as I reported here recently.
Officials hope to resume crewed launches as soon as possible.
Timing is critical because the Soyuz crew capsule for the trio currently living on the station is only warrantied to last in orbit about 210 days - and that time expires in early January.
If launches do not resume by January, officials may have to leaved the ISS uncrewed for some period of time – something which is not at all desirable considering the stations complex operating systems.
The next Soyuz launch had been scheduled for December 20 with a three person crew comprising Soyuz MS-11 commander Oleg Kononenko, Canadian astronaut David Saint-Jacques and NASA astronaut Anne McClain.
Roscosmos is considering moving that Soyuz MS-10 launch up by a few weeks if the corrective actions can be implemented. But still TBD.
As for whether Hague and Ovchinin will be given another shot at a launch at some point is also still TBD.
However Dimitri Rogozin, the head of Roscosmos, has said he hope to fly them again soon, perhaps as soon as this coming spring.
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This beautiful mural at the
Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex showcases the International
Space Station where the two man
American/Russian crew were heading until the emergency in flight Soyuz
abort shortly after liftoff Oct. 11, 2018 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. Thankfully their Soyuz
MS-10 capsule ejected and
they landed safe. The mural art highlights the cooperation of the multinational
partners who make ISS possible
to carry out science for all humankind - backdropped by the shuttle that hauled
most of it to orbit. Credit: Ken
Kremer/kenkremer.com/spaceupclose.com
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Dr. Kremer is a research
scientist and journalist based in the KSC area.
………….
Ken’s photos are for sale and he is available for lectures and outreach events
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| Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/spaceupclose.com |
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