Scott Manley's video[0] is interesting because he (among others) realized that the rotation was way more serious while the official 45° rotation story was still the news.
Considering the tensions surrounding NASA and other Russian space events I'm not surprised NASA might avoid pointing the finger a great deal, especially if Russians are going to reveal what happened on their own as described in this article.
By all accounts, Roscosmos is completely corrupt and NASA can't afford to lose Russia as an ISS partner.
You'll note that even though a SpaceX Crew Dragon was also attached to the ISS at the time, it was not used to counteract Nauka's thrust and the only mention of it was that it could be powered up quickly as an escape pod.
Part of that is due to the low lever-arm position of it, but I also believe it was probably never programmed to provide pitch and yaw support, and maybe not even altitude reboost. I am willing to bet that software is being written right now, though.
Really good summary of a lot of details from the Russian language side of what happened with the module. Though the author seems to use a bunch of what appears to be poorly machine translated quotes.
With that long list of problems and failed sensors & software on the Nauka module, the Russian team's hands-on real-time efforts to keep the thing functionally flying seem quite impressive - sharp save-the-day work.
That said, allowing the thing to dock before they could implement more stable fixes seems quite unwise - and especially just before a flight path out of communication with the team. Why couldn't they just wait a few orbits or days?
Seems as unwise as launching a shuttle in out-of-spec cold conditions, they just barely got away with it this time. I recall seeing a recent high level criticism of NASA losing (again) its safety culture - seems like another supporting data point for that thesis.
you would hesitate to download and install a Russian app, yet it seems ok to attach a Russian module to ISS :) Supposedly because Russian module for ISS passed stricter checks. According to whom? Russian team has just participated in Olympics without state flag and symbols because of doping testing scandal. The sport and space are among the main pillars of the Russian state self-glorification, and everything goes when it comes to face-saving there.
In the second half of the 199x i had an acquaintance who was director of a department building some electronic systems for Russian space. He told me a lot of backstories of how the Russian space sausage was being made. From sourcing parts for the Mir station at the local flea market ("Avtovo" who still remembers) to "what do you want, the whole year the salaries weren't paid and nobody was working, and a month before the launch they pay the salaries and the satellite is hastily built, no testing to speak of, and launched, of course it quickly failed". These days the situation with salaries is a bit better while the rest is pretty much the same, and the surfacing story with Nauka sounds just like one of those backstories. And that is on top of that hole in a Russian module sometime ago - one can see the progression from the hole affecting ISS's air to the badly behaving Nauka affecting ISS's position to ...
It is hard to comprehend how many of the space-related feats of engineering were accomplished by the Soviet Union. On a trip to the Baikonur Cosmodrome, I was stunned by the size of the test stand for the Energia rocket. It is massive, with numerous support buildings, lighting, pipelines and support vehicles. The amount of poured concrete is mind boggling. This stand was only used once.
The actual launch stand for Energia is similar in scope and it was only used twice. Of course, during the first Energia-Polyus launch, Polyus seperated from Energia, did a 360 degress rotation and burned up in the atmosphere. It is difficult to reconcile this mixture of competence and incompetence.
The "I" in "ISS" stands for International. It is a collaboration between the USA, Russia, Japan, Europe, and Canada, with the USA and Russia being responsible for most of its initial construction.
It is one of the crowning achievements of humanity so far and helps to prove that we don't all suffer from the same petty xenophobia that your comment demonstrates.
Up until May of last year the United States didn't even have human launch capability. Not a hell of a lot you can do with an orbital station if you can't send people up there.
> From sourcing parts for the Mir station at the local flea market
They use mil-spec parts for that, and you can't buy them at a "flea market".
> the whole year the salaries weren't paid and nobody was working
This, on the other hand, is plausible. 90s were a shitshow, hence Putin and "order".
[+] [-] breput|4 years ago|reply
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDBt9rZhMb4
[+] [-] aero-glide2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] duxup|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] breput|4 years ago|reply
By all accounts, Roscosmos is completely corrupt and NASA can't afford to lose Russia as an ISS partner.
You'll note that even though a SpaceX Crew Dragon was also attached to the ISS at the time, it was not used to counteract Nauka's thrust and the only mention of it was that it could be powered up quickly as an escape pod.
Part of that is due to the low lever-arm position of it, but I also believe it was probably never programmed to provide pitch and yaw support, and maybe not even altitude reboost. I am willing to bet that software is being written right now, though.
[+] [-] Waterluvian|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] colordrops|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mlindner|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mlindner|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] wumpus|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toss1|4 years ago|reply
That said, allowing the thing to dock before they could implement more stable fixes seems quite unwise - and especially just before a flight path out of communication with the team. Why couldn't they just wait a few orbits or days?
Seems as unwise as launching a shuttle in out-of-spec cold conditions, they just barely got away with it this time. I recall seeing a recent high level criticism of NASA losing (again) its safety culture - seems like another supporting data point for that thesis.
[+] [-] iampivot|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] trhway|4 years ago|reply
In the second half of the 199x i had an acquaintance who was director of a department building some electronic systems for Russian space. He told me a lot of backstories of how the Russian space sausage was being made. From sourcing parts for the Mir station at the local flea market ("Avtovo" who still remembers) to "what do you want, the whole year the salaries weren't paid and nobody was working, and a month before the launch they pay the salaries and the satellite is hastily built, no testing to speak of, and launched, of course it quickly failed". These days the situation with salaries is a bit better while the rest is pretty much the same, and the surfacing story with Nauka sounds just like one of those backstories. And that is on top of that hole in a Russian module sometime ago - one can see the progression from the hole affecting ISS's air to the badly behaving Nauka affecting ISS's position to ...
[+] [-] diskzero|4 years ago|reply
The actual launch stand for Energia is similar in scope and it was only used twice. Of course, during the first Energia-Polyus launch, Polyus seperated from Energia, did a 360 degress rotation and burned up in the atmosphere. It is difficult to reconcile this mixture of competence and incompetence.
[+] [-] LeoPanthera|4 years ago|reply
It is one of the crowning achievements of humanity so far and helps to prove that we don't all suffer from the same petty xenophobia that your comment demonstrates.
[+] [-] m0zg|4 years ago|reply
> From sourcing parts for the Mir station at the local flea market
They use mil-spec parts for that, and you can't buy them at a "flea market".
> the whole year the salaries weren't paid and nobody was working
This, on the other hand, is plausible. 90s were a shitshow, hence Putin and "order".