ISS lifted by 3.5 km to prepare for next crew's arrival in fall

MOSCOW. June 17 (Interfax) - The International Space Station (ISS) orbit has been lifted 3.5 kilometers to prepare the arrival of the Soyuz MS-26 manned spaceship and the Soyuz MS-25 landing in September 2024, Roscosmos said.

"Engines of the Progress MS-26 resupply ship, docked to to the Zvezda service module of the ISS Russian segment, were started at 7:40 a.m. According to the preliminary information of the Mission Control Center of the Central Research Institute for Machine Building [part of the Roscosmos state corporation], they ran for 1,390.3 seconds, giving an impulse of 2 meters per second," Roscosmos said.

An average altitude of the station's orbit was raised 3.5 kilometers to 418.38 kilometers, it said.

Soyuz MS-26 is scheduled to be launched by a Soyuz-2.1a rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on September 11, it said. Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexei Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner and NASA astronaut Donald Pettit will fly the spaceship.

In turn, Soyuz MS-25 operated by Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Konenko and Nikolai Chub and NASA astronaut Tracy Dyson is due to land on September 23, Roscosmos said.