NASA is discussing with SpaceX the possibility of returning Russian cosmonauts on Crew Dragon
The epic of the leaky Soyuz MS-22 continues. According to Reuters, NASA is discussing with SpaceX the possibility of returning Russian cosmonauts on Crew Dragon.
It is not clear whether they are talking about the Crew Dragon Endurance of the SpaceX Crew-5 mission, which is currently docked with the ISS, or about another Crew Dragon that can be quickly delivered to the space station.
“We have asked SpaceX a few questions on their capability to return additional crew members on Dragon if necessary, but that is not our prime focus at this time,” NASA spokeswoman Sandra Jones said in a statement to Reuters.
The fact is that the Crew Dragon Endurance has only four lodgements for the astronauts who arrived on it at the ISS on October 6, 2022. They are NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, JAXA astronaut Koichi Wakata and Russian Anna Kikina. It is not clear where Sergey Prokopyev, Dmitry Petelin and Francisco Rubio (NASA) will go. Unless you put them at the foot or in the luggage compartment (just kidding), there is no place to get new lodgements at the station, and lodgements from Soyuz MS-22 are not compatible with Crew Dragon.
As an option, they can return four NASA and JAXA astronauts to Earth, and leave the Russians on the ISS to wait for the next Soyuz or Crew Dragon… On the other hand, leaving the Russians alone on the ISS is not a very good idea.
As for the next Soyuz MS-23, the only thing I want to ask Rogozin, who was recently injured, is: “What about trampolines?!”.