Russian Progress Cargo Ship Docks With Space Station

An anonymous reader writes: An unmanned Russian cargo ship has successfully docked with the International Space Station. The successful launch, rendezvous and docking came after two resupply failures. A Progress launched in April spun out of control and a week ago, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket disintegrated, destroying a supply ship loaded with supplies and equipment. "Crew reports, 'feels like Christmas in July,'" the International Space Station tweeted.

Comments

Looks like we are making Progress

[jfdavis668]

I'm glad the ISS crew won't suffocate now.

Thank you Mr. Putin

[SpaceXXX]

Our nation wants to thank you again for saving ISS and July 4th celebration.
Every year now, during 4th of July week we will salute strong Russia and will be forever grateful for your generosity.

I seriously would like to know

[ClaraBow]

why NASA is relying on private companies to build the next-generation spacecraft. NASA had a dependable spacecraft. Couldn't they have improved the Space Shuttle? There has to be more going here than just money. Seriously, we can afford a war anytime we feel like fighting one, but when it comes to science and space exploration, we suddenly don't have money.

Re:I seriously would like to know

[spiritplumber]

Shuttle: Take 50 ton ship in orbit to carry 5 tons of payload. Rebuild most of it after every flight. Soyuz stack: Take 8 ton ship in orbit to carry 5 tons of payload. Scrap what's left of it after flight, don't worry about reliability of parts. Turns out most of the cost (and the mass) is the fuel.

Re:I seriously would like to know

[CrimsonAvenger]

It's sad that we can't even get a rocket to reliably deliver cargo to the International Space Station -- It's upsetting and depressing!

You'd almost think from reading this that the Russians could reliably deliver cargo to ISS...

Which might suggest that you're aware of the failure of the Dragon at the end of last month and the failure of Cygnus nine months ago, but unaware that in April the Russian resupply mission to ISS failed.

You also appear to be unaware that this was the second Russian failure to resupply the ISS (the first was in 2011).

For what it's worth, the EU and Japan haven't failed an ISS resupply mission yet. Of course, between them they've done about 10% of the ISS resupply flights.

On the other hand, NASA is the only agency that hasn't managed an ISS resupply mission at all. The US resupply missions have all been CRS (SpaceX and Cygnus)....