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US astronaut lauds Russian spaceship's record travel time to ISS

The Progress MS-11 reached the ISS to carry out its resupply mission on a two-orbit, super fast-track rendezvous profile with the orbital outpost

NASA Astronaut Nick Hague Sergei Savostyanov/TASS

NASA Astronaut Nick Hague

© Sergei Savostyanov/TASS

TASS, April 5. On Friday, NASA Astronaut Nick Hague hailed the record time the Progress MS-11 resupply ship took to cover the distance to the International Space Station (ISS) calling it impressive.

A visitor arrived at @Space_Station today...the progress resupply vehicle made record timing as it launched and docked to the station in under three and a half hours. Pretty impressive! pic.twitter.com/S6Zy9daF04
— Nick Hague (@AstroHague) 5 April 2019

A Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket with a Progress MS-11 cargo spaceship blasted off from Site No. 31 of the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 2:01 p.m. Moscow time on Thursday. Three hours and 21 minutes later the spaceship docked to the ISS. Commenting on the new record time, Director General of Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin compared the flight time to the time it takes to get from the Baikonur Cosmodrome to Moscow.

The Progress MS-11 reached the ISS to carry out its resupply mission on a two-orbit, super fast-track rendezvous profile with the orbital outpost. Before July 2018, Russia’s Progress spaceships blasted off to the ISS either on a two-day schedule (34 rotations around the planet).

Russia first used the super fast-tracked rendezvous with the space station during the launch of the Progress MS-09 resupply ship, which successfully reached the orbital outpost on July 10, 2018 in slightly more than three and a half hours.
The next spacecraft, the Progress MS-10, again flew to the ISS on November 16, 2018 using the old two-day scheme, as this was the first launch of a Soyuz-FG carrier rocket after the October 11, 2018 faulty liftoff.

The space freighter has delivered two tonnes of various cargoes to the space station, in particular, fuel, scientific equipment, foodstuffs and medicine.

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