NASA Visited Moscow to Ensure Safety of Soyuz MS-23

UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik) - US agency NASA has visited Russian state space corporation Roscosmos in Moscow to make sure that Russia's rockets are safe and that the Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft can fly back to the American astronaut, NASA International Space Station (ISS) Manager Joel Montalbano said on Sunday.

"I can tell you that when I was just in Moscow a couple of weeks ago for the Soyuz launch, and docking. When we were over there, we talked about a number of things: in addition to MMOD [Micrometeoroids and Orbital Debris] the team and Roscosmos and Energia - they're looking at manufacturing. Is there something there, did something change in the production of these vehicles? Which is exactly what we would do on our site," Montalbano said during a press conference.

He added that NASA is confident in Soyuz MS-23, but there is a constant need to check the vehicle.

"We are confident in this vehicle … But we are always looking," Montalbano said.

Two Roscosmos spacecraft experienced depressurization over the past three months.

On February 11, Roscosmos reported a depressurization of the thermal circuit of the Progress MS-21 cargo spacecraft docked to the ISS. The spacecraft spent more than three months in the station, with its undocking and deorbiting scheduled for February 18. In December of last year, shortly before a spacewalk, the thermal circuit of the manned spacecraft Soyuz MS-22 depressurized. A Soyuz-2.1a rocket with the Soyuz MS-23 unmanned spacecraft docked on the ISS from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on February 26. The Soyuz MS-23 should bring back the Soyuz MS-22 crew, Russian cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin, as well as US astronaut Frank Rubio, back to Earth on September 27, 2023.