ISS, January 12. /TASS/. The Russian crewmembers of the International Space Station (ISS) are preparing the Progress MS-20 resupply ship that helped the orbital outpost avoid collision with space debris on several occasions for its undocking scheduled for February 7, TASS special reporter in orbit, Roscosmos cosmonaut Dmitry Petelin reported on Thursday.
The cosmonauts are now transferring supplies to the ISS from the space freighter and loading it with garbage for its removal from the orbital outpost, Petelin said.
The cargo craft will undock from the ISS on February 7 and several hours after that it will burn up in the atmosphere while its incombustible fragments will splash down in the non-navigable area of the Pacific Ocean. Two days later, the Progress MS-22 resupply ship will launch to the International Space Station from the Baikonur spaceport, he said.
The launch of the next Progress space freighter was initially scheduled for February 19 but the timeframe was altered over changes in the flight program of the ISS Russian segment due to the need to send the Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft to the orbital outpost early.
The Progress MS-20 resupply ship helped the ISS avoid collision with space debris on four occasions (June 16, October 17, October 25 and December 21, 2022) and also adjusted the orbit five times in nominal mode (August 10, August 25, September 15, October 1 and November 30, 2022).
On November 17, 2021, Russia’s world-renowned TASS news agency and the State Space Corporation Roscosmos signed a memorandum of cooperation, under which a TASS news office was established aboard the ISS. Cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin was the first TASS special reporter in space. His flight lasted 12 days. Cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev was the second TASS special reporter in space. Presently, Dmitry Petelin is heading the TASS outer space-based branch.