20.09.2019

Russian State Space Corporation Roscosmos found out the causes of a "hole" in the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft, but will not disclose the information, Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin said.

"It was in the household compartment [of the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft], it already burned down long ago when the ship was descending. We took all the samples. What happened is clear to us, but we won't tell you anything", Rogozin said at a meeting with the participants of a scientific youth conference.

"We may have some secrets", he said.

Prior to that, the Russian Prosecutor General's Office conducted an inquiry into the precise location of the hole in cooperation with other authorities.

The statement referred to the incident when the crew of the International Space Station (ISS) detected on 30 August 2018, an insignificant air leak, caused by a microfracture on a wall of the living section of the Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft, docked to the ISS. The hole was patched on the same day to restore the hermetic integrity of the ISS.

Following the incident, Russian State Space Agency Roscosmos set up a special commission to investigate the episode, and the commission concluded in October 2018 that the incident had not been caused by a manufacturing defect.

Quelle: SD