YEKATERINBURG, December 2. /TASS/. An air defense unit of Russia’s Central Military District stationed in West Siberia says that on Thursday evening it identified two objects within its area of responsibility that may turn out to be fragments of the Progress MS-04 cargo spacecraft, Central Military District spokesman, Yaroslav Roshchupkin, has told TASS.
"Radio-technical means of the Central Military District’s air defense unit on December 1 identified two flying objects on radar screens at 17:56 and 17:57 Moscow time. Specialists studied their flight paths to arrive at the conclusion with nearly 100% certainty that the objects were fragments of the Progress spacecraft," Roshchupkin said.
Military personnel are not involved in search operations, the Central Military District said.
A cargo space vehicle of the Progress series, launched from the Baikonur space site in Kazakhstan at 17:51 Moscow time on Thursday was lost at an altitude of 190 kilometers over the Tyva region. Most of its fragments burned down in the atmosphere.
According to some reports several fragments may have reached the Earth’s surface in a sparsely populated area 60-80 kilometers west of the city of Kyzyl. Search groups of the Emergencies Ministry have inspected territories around four communities in the Ulug-Khem, Chaa-Khol and Sut-Khol districts of Tyva to find nothing.