Russian space station cargo ship crashes!

Soyuz rocket

         Russian cargo rocket ferrying three tonnes of food and fuel to the International Space Station broke down about five minutes after it blasted off, completing its flight by arcing into a Siberian forest rather than achieving orbit.

Since the retirement of the US space shuttle program last month, Russian-made Soyuz rockets are the only means of transport to space for American astronauts. NASA has contracted with the Russian Space Agency to fly Americans on these rockets for several years.

                           

                                     

The crash of the unmanned craft, a Progress cargo ship on top of a Soyuz rocket, does not pose an immediate problem for the six crew members living at the space station, who are well stocked with supplies taken there in July by NASA's last shuttle flight. But it raises questions about the reliability of this model of Russian rocket, a similar model of which is used for manned launchings.

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The cargo vessel had blasted off at 5:00 pm Moscow time (1300 GMT) on a Soyuz-U rocket from Russia's Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The Interfax news agency said it was the first problem with a Russian or Soviet cargo delivery to space since 1978.

                                     

Wednesday's crash will surely be closely scrutinised because of its implications for American manned space flight on the Russian rockets. If a quick diagnosis and fix elude Russian engineers, NASA and the other agencies collaborating on the space 

station could face difficult choices.

                                                     

The explosion was so strong that for 100 kilometers (60 miles) glass almost flew out of the windows. The astronauts present there were U.S. astronauts Ron Garan and Mike Fossum, Japan's Satoshi Furukawa and Russian cosmonauts Sergei Volkov, Alexander Samokutyayev and mission commander Andrey Borisenko. The space station is currently stocked by Russia's Progress vehicle and robot cargo ships built by the European and Japanese space agencies.

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