MOSCOW (AP) - Last month's
botched landing of a Russian capsule returning from the international space
station was caused when an equipment module failed to separate from the capsule
on time, a Russian space official said Wednesday.
The Soyuz
TMA-11 craft carrying U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko
and South Korean bioengineer Yi So-yeon landed hundreds of kilometers off
course when it bounced onto the steppes of northern Kazakhstan on April 19.
The three were subjected to
severe G-forces, communications were disrupted and Russian officials said they
had been in serious danger during the descent.
Alexei Krasnov, who heads
Russia's manned space program, said after the Soyuz's separation from the space
station, the equipment bay module was supposed to detach, allowing the capsule
to enter the atmosphere and descend to Earth smoothly.
That did not happen, he
said, and the Soyuz went into a "ballistic'' descent.
He said Russian experts
would soon finish
the final report on the flawed landing, which was the second in a row - and
the third since 2003.
Officials with the U.S.
space agency, NASA, have been watching the progress of the investigation
closely since Russian-built Soyuz and Progress ships are a primary means for
getting crew and cargo to and from the orbiting station.
As well, a Soyuz capsule is
always docked at the station as an emergency "lifeboat" in case the crew needs
it.
NASA officials on Monday
set a May
31 launch date for the next space shuttle mission and said that Russia's
investigation into last month's rocky landing of its own spacecraft should not
interfere.
Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's
space operations chief, said there would be no benefit to delaying the shuttle
mission to allow the Russians more time to investigate the landing.
An American is scheduled to
blast into orbit aboard the next Soyuz in October.
advertisement
