Uncontrollable coolant leak on Russian ISS capsule puts future missions in jeopardy

Russia's space agency said in a statement that the crew capsule of the International Space Station had been damaged by an uncontrollable coolant leak.

There will be a concert on Wednesday at 7:45pm. While Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin were preparing for a spacewalk outside the International Space Station, there was a violent coolant leak on Russia's Soyuz MS-22. The extravehicular activity was stopped after the two cosmonauts were already wearing their space suits. There are cameras on the outside of the space station that show a steady stream of frozen coolant shooting into space as the cosmonauts return to the main body of the station.

According to preliminary information, the outer skin of the instrument and assembly compartment was damaged on Thursday, December 15. The incident occurred in the early hours of December 15th.

There's a leak at the space station.

A pressure drop in the cooling system was reported by the crew after the warning device of the diagnostic system went off. The crew members of the Russian segment of the International Space Station were forced to stop their extravehicular activities after a visual inspection confirmed the leak.

The crew is safe at the moment, all systems are functioning normally. After analyzing the situation, a decision will be made on the further actions of both specialists on Earth and members of the crew of the Russian segment of the International Space Station.

NASA and Roscosmos will continue to work together to determine the next course of action after the analysis is complete. The crew of the space station were not in danger during the leak.

NASA responded to a request for more detailed information from Space.com and will issue an update on its website.

It's not clear how the leak and damage to the Soyuz craft will affect the planned March 2023 return of theMS-22 crew, which includes NASA astronauts. The MS-22 capsule was supposed to carry four people home, but no one has said if it's still flightworthy.

It is not known if the leak caused any damage to the International Space Station as a whole or the cargo ship docked nearby. NASA's Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, as well as Japan's Koichi Wakata and Anna Kikina, were taken to the space station in October 2022.

Ammonia can be corrosive to many metals and the space agencies haven't said which particular coolant leaked from the Soyuz vehicle.

On Space.com.