ISS, August 21. /TASS/. The Progress MS-22 cargo spacecraft will depart from the Russian segment of the International Space Station (ISS) in the early hours on Monday, Russia’s space corporation Roscosmos told reporters.
The cargo spaceship is expected to undock from the Zvezda module at 2:49 a.m. Moscow time before setting off for free flight. The spacecraft is expected to fire braking engines at 5:58 a.m. Moscow time, after which it will deorbit and enter the Earth’s atmosphere. The bulk of the spaceship will burn in the atmosphere, while its fireproof elements will fall in the South Pacific.
The Progress MS-22 has been at the ISS since February 11 when it delivered more than 2.5 metric tons of cargo to the space station. Over the period, the cargo ship carried out evasion maneuvers three times to protect the ISS from space debris and readjusted the orbit seven times as scheduled.
Next week, the Progress MS-24 cargo spacecraft will dock with the ISS, replacing the Progress MS-22. The launch of the Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket with the Porgress MS-24 is scheduled for August 23. It is expected to reach the ISS in two days’ time.
The current crew on board the ISS includes Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev, Dmitry Petelin (TASS special correspondent on the ISS), Andrey Fedyaev, NASA astronauts Frank Rubio, Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, as well as United Arab Emirates’ astronaut Sultan al-Neyadi.