Cargo ship fails on way to space station

    The spaceship Progress 65 launched from Kazakhstan at 9:51 a.m. EST Thursday, and everything was going smoothly, but flight controllers detected a problem during the firing of the rocket’s third stage, six and a half minutes into the flight, a NASA news release reported. 
    A statement from Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, said that “most of cargo spacecraft fragments burned in the dense atmosphere.” 
    The spacecraft was loaded with more than 2.6 tons of food, fuel and supplies, according to NASA, including 112 pounds of oxygen, 925 pounds of water and 2,750 pounds of spare parts. U.S. supplies on board included spare parts for the station’s environmental control and life support system, research hardware, crew supplies and crew clothing. All are replaceable.          
    The crew of the space station is in no danger, and both the Russian and U.S. segments of the station are operating normally. The next mission scheduled to deliver cargo to the station is a spacecraft of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) on Dec. 9.
    The loss of the Progress is only the most recent mishap involving cargo resupply spacecraft. While it was the Russian space agency this time, American resupply ships, operated by business contractors, also have gone up in flames. There were three explosions in nine months spanning 2014-15:  

• Oct. 28, 2014: A catastrophic explosion destroyed an unmanned Orbital Sciences Corp. resupply rocket bound for the space station.
• April 28, 2015: Progress 59, A Russian spacecraft, launched from Kazakhstan on a Soyuz rocket headed for the space station. Problems developed as the cargo ship separated from the Soyuz booster’s third stage. Russian flight controllers couldn’t determine “whether navigational antennas had deployed and whether fuel system manifolds had pressurized as planned,” NASA’s press release said.
• June 28, 2015: An unmanned SpaceX supply ship, loaded with a docking system and food for the space station, exploded approximately two minutes after takeoff.

 If you would like to comment give us a shout or like us on Facebook and tell us what you think.