Next Progress cargo vehicle will be launched with the help of Soyuz-U booster instead Soyuz-2.1a that failed to launch Progress M-27M on April 28. This will enable to improve Soyuz-2.1a third stage that was the cause of April accident. Institute for Space Politics Director Ivan Moiseyev said yesterday, on June 9.
“When investigating off-nominal situations we generally take series of measures directed to prevent such accidents in the future. Those very nodes causing the accidents are being changed or improved at that. That is why next Soyuz-2.1a is to be launched in November not in July”, – he said.
According to him all necessary operations will be conducted by the next launch. “It will be a stage with new upgraded nodes. The stage itself remains the same, since replacing the whole stage may take several years, – the expert explained.
We remind that on June 1, 2015, Roscosmos officially announced spaceship and booster joint use constructive peculiarity related to vehicle and booster’s 3rd stage cluster frequency and dynamic characteristics a cause of the accident taken place on April 28.
At that the Agency points out that there are no limitations preventing from using Soyuz-2.1 booster for launching other space devices.
