MOSCOW, Nov 16, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – A Russian Soyuz rocket with a cargo
vessel is to blast off Friday in the first launch to the International Space
Station (ISS) since a manned accident last month.
“The mission control centre has completed the work set out for the launch
of the Progress MS-10 cargo vessel. The takeoff of the Soyuz-FG rocket is set
for 1814 GMT,” Russian space agency Roscosmos said in a statement.
The launch from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan is seen as a
rehearsal for the next manned voyage, planned for December 3.
That flight is to carry Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko, Canadian
astronaut David Saint-Jacques, and NASA’s Anne McClain to the ISS.
Russia, the only country able to ferry astronauts to the space station,
suspended all launches after a Soyuz rocket failed on October 11 just minutes
after blast-off.
It was the first such incident in the history of post-Soviet space travel.
During the aborted launch, Russian cosmonaut Aleksey Ovchinin and US
astronaut Nick Hague made an emergency landing and escaped unharmed.
NASA had planned a launch of its own supply vessel on Thursday but it was
delayed until the weekend because of poor weather.
The Progress MS-10 takes around 48 hours to reach the ISS, bringing with it
fuel, oxygen, water and scientific materials.
A commission to probe the October 11 accident reported that the flight was
aborted because a sensor part had been damaged during assembly.