NASA and Roscomos are still investigating the coolant leak that struck a Soyuz spacecraft docked at the International Space Station (ISS) last month, but this is more than a logistical headache. Without an operational Soyuz capsule, the crew doesn’t have enough seats to evacuate the station in the event of an emergency. NASA is now in talks with SpaceX to come up with a backup plan that could leverage the Crew Dragon, which is also docked at the station.
The unexpected coolant leak in mid-December sprayed ammonia around the station, scuttling a planned spacewalk. The cause of the leak is still unclear, but inspection with cameras attached to the station’s Canadarm2 spotted a small hole that could be the result of a micrometeoroid impact. Neither NASA nor Roscosmos considers the leaky Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft suitable to transport astronauts back to Earth. This has led Russian authorities to consider accelerating plans to send up a new Soyuz, which would arrive at the station in February, ready to carry cosmonauts Sergey Prokopeyev and Dmitri Petelin and astronaut Frank Rubio back home in April.
Since the early phases of ISS construction, space agencies have always made sure to have enough spacecraft docked at the station to evacuate the crew if the need arises. It’s not unheard of for the crew to take shelter in these vessels when the station has close calls with orbiting space debris. Now that the Soyuz is out of commission, there aren’t enough seats for all seven crew members — the Soyuz carries three, and SpaceX’s Dragon can carry four.
Cosmonaut Anna Kikina used the robotic Canadarm2 to capture this image of Soyuz after the leak. Credit: NASA
NASA says that understanding what happened to the Soyuz is still the primary focus, but it has reached out to SpaceX to inquire about the possibility of evacuating all seven crew members in the Dragon that is also docked at the ISS. There’s no reason to think that would not be feasible in an emergency. SpaceX designed the Crew Dragon to carry a maximum of seven passengers. However, only four seats are used on NASA flights. So, it’s probably more a matter of how, not if, the Dragon could get everyone home safely.
Of course, it’s unlikely the crew would need to evacuate the station, and it may only be another few months before there is a new Soyuz docked and ready to carry three crew members back home. Discussions are still ongoing, but we should hear more about “normal and contingency scenarios” later this month.
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