14 DAY TRIAL // The issue preventing the Progress resupply ship from docking with the International Space Station has been fixed. Luckily or unluckily, depending on your perspective, it didn't require a spacewalk. The ship has now safely docked with the space station.
Rather, the problem was eventually fixed with a software patch, something that's becoming increasingly common in space. That's how an issue with the Dragon spacecraft was fixed as well.
Progress 51 is carrying supplies and scientific experiments for the ISS. Shortly after reaching orbit, an antenna used for navigation failed to deploy properly.
This didn't affect the ship's ability to climb to ISS's orbit altitude, but it could have posed a problem when docking as it might have prevented the seal to close properly between the craft and the floating laboratory.
Thankfully, engineers were able to provide a patch that enabled Progress to automatically navigate and dock with the ISS. The ISS crew was standing by to attempt a manual approach if the automatic system failed.