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TASS special reporter on ISS sheds light on disposal of space garbage

According to Oleg Kononenko, the cosmonauts also practiced rendezvous control and tested the remote control mode as they discussed the details of docking with the Mission Control Center

ISS, November 29. /TASS/. Used up equipment and household waste were loaded onto the Progress MS-23 cargo spacecraft on Wednesday, Oleg Kononenko, commander of the Roscosmos cosmonaut team and TASS special reporter on board the International Space Station, said.

"Today, we closed the hatches of the Progress MS-23 space freighter. It will take with it old equipment and household waste, or everything the experts have decided to toss from the station," Kononenko said. "A radiogram with a list of cargo for disposal is sent to the crew on board [the ISS] in advance. The crew is given instructions concerning the time and arrangements needed to find equipment for removal," he specified.

According to Kononenko, the cosmonauts also practiced rendezvous control and tested the remote control mode as they discussed the details of docking with the Mission Control Center.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Progress MS-23 undocked from the Russian segment of the ISS to vacate its place for the next resupply ship, Progress MS-25. The Progress MS-23 freighter undocked from the Poisk mini-research module at 10:55 a.m. Moscow time (7:55 a.m. GMT). The spacecraft is expected to deorbit and enter the dense layers of the Earth’s atmosphere after firing breaking thrusters. Most of the resupply ship will burn up in the atmosphere while its incombustible fragments will splash down in the non-navigable area of the southern Pacific Ocean.

The Progress MS-23 resupply ship arrived at the orbital outpost on May 24 of this year, delivering almost 2.5 tons of cargo, including an URM-D universal workstation, which Roscosmos cosmonauts installed outside the Russian Zvezda module in their extravehicular activity on August 9.

The Progress MS-25 resupply ship is scheduled to blast off from the Baikonur spaceport on December 1 and dock with the ISS on December 3.