Russia to sent new Soyuz capsule after ISS damaged by tiny meteoroid

euronews.com:

Russia said on Wednesday it would launch another Soyuz spacecraft next month to bring home two of its own cosmonauts and a US astronaut from the International Space Station after their original capsule was struck by a micrometeoroid and started leaking.

The last month's leak came from a tiny puncture -- less than 1 millimetre wide -- on the external cooling system of the Soyuz MS-22 capsule, one of two return capsules docked to the ISS that can bring crew members home.

"Having analysed the condition of the spacecraft, thermal calculations and technical documentation, it has been concluded that the MS-22 must be landed without a crew on board," said Yuri Borisov, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos.

Russia said a new capsule, Soyuz MS-23, would be sent up on 20 February from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to replace the damaged Soyuz MS-22, which will be returned to Earth empty. The new capsule will have to fly to the ISS in autopilot mode, too.

The original plan was to launch the MS-23 in March with two Russians and one American, replacing the three already up there. This new crew will now have to wait until late summer or fall to fly when another capsule is ready for them.

Russian cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin and US astronaut Francisco Rubio had been due to end their mission in March but will now extend it by a few more months and return aboard the MS-23.

"They are ready to go with whatever decision we give them," Joel Montalbano, NASA's ISS program manager, told a news conference. "I may have to fly some more ice cream to reward them," he added.

If there is an emergency in the meantime, Roscosmos said it would look at whether the MS-22 spacecraft can be used to rescue the crew. In this