14 DAY TRIAL // Since Columbia's disaster two years ago, the only supply link to the astronauts on the International Space Station has been the Russian space program. In a situation where all American shuttles have been grounded for safety reasons, the modules launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome have been the one thing keeping mankind in space.
The latest module to leave towards ISS has been the Progress M-53 cargo ship, which lifted off Friday morning, at around 3:10 a.m. Moscow time (2310 GMT).
The ship is carrying about 2.5 tons of food, water, oxygen, and other supplies for the US astronaut John Phillips and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Krikalyov, on duty aboard the station since April this year. The ship will also contain a delivery of fuel supplies for direction boosters, potable and technical-usage water, as well as some scientific equipment.
The problem of the oxygen was of outmost importance, since the oxygen generator has broken a few weeks ago and the astronauts have been living solely on the reserves in the tanks ever since.
But more supplies and equipments will soon be available, since the space shuttle Discovery is scheduled to take off sometimes between July 13 and 31 and then rendezvous with the station.
In the mean time, another Progress M-52 cargo ship has been successfully undocked and sent back to Earth, where it landed somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, in its designated waters near the Easter Island. This was a part of the over 1 ton of thrash jettisoned from ISS, in order to make room for the new supplies.