"Miloch" wrote in message news

more at
https://arstechnica.com/science/2018...ter-collision/

For the second human launch in a row, there's a likely quality-control
issue.

A recent Soyuz capsule docked with the ISS was found to contain a tiny hole
through which air was escaping -- and Russian investigators said it looked
to have been deliberately drilled. Is there a saboteur lurking in the
Russian space agency? https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45423225

On Thursday, Russian space officials held a news conference to lay out
their findings into an October 11 accident that involved the launch of a
Soyuz FG rocket and its spacecraft. The crew of NASA astronaut Nick Hague
and Russian cosmonaut Aleksey Ovchinin escaped safely, but the rocket was
destroyed.

The problem, the officials said, boiled down to a "bent" sensor on one of
the rocket's four boosters that failed to properly signal stage
separation. This caused one of the booster stages to improperly separate
from the rocket, which can be seen in the video released by the space
agency. This booster then struck the core of the rocket, causing a
significant jolt and triggering one of the Soyuz spacecraft's automatic
escape systems.

This was almost a repeat performance of something that happened in 1975:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_7K-T_No.39

When the crew realized they weren't going to make it into orbit, they
radioed, "Are we going to land in China?" No response. Again they asked. The
response: "We have a treaty with the Chinese, don't we?" Instead of a normal
re-entry spread out of several minutes, they followed an uncontrolled
ballistic trajectory and decelerated from 10,000 mph to 500 mph in about
thirty seconds. The G-meter in the capsule only went up to 18 Gs. It pegged
and then broke. After the chute popped, they tumbled down a mountainside and
came to a stop at the edge of a cliff. Wolves reportedly circled the capsule
all night. They were finally rescued late the next day.

Try as they might, the Russkies seem to be on a slippery slope:
https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/ht.../20181028.aspx

Russia has suspended further manned flights until an answer can be found for
the malfunction...