The unprecedented decision on unmanned flights for both Soyuz MS-22 Tsiolkovsky and Soyuz MS-23 was caused by the department's attempt to compensate for the hit of micrometeorite in the first of these ships.
Roscosmos held a meeting of the commission on the situation with the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft. Immediately after that, an event atypical for the domestic space agency took place: its head, Yuri Borisov, made a video announcement in which he announced the results of the meeting.
Firstly, it turned out that the damage to the cooling radiator of the Soyuz MS-22, now docked to the ISS, was caused by a micrometeoroid (this was established using a movable camera of the American segment). The version about a possible manufacturing defect of the radiator has not been confirmed. Secondly, the commission made a decision on the unmanned return to Earth of the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft. It is difficult to say how successful it will be in advance: in the absence of a working cooling radiator, the temperature on board may seriously deviate from the standard values, which will complicate the functioning of electronics.
In addition, the commission decided that the next Russian ship to the ISS, Soyuz MS-22, will also fly there in unmanned mode. Earlier, a similar flight, without a crew on board, was undertaken by Soyuz MS-14. It took place in the "cargo-return" version, in which part of the equipment for the crew's work was removed from the ship. Now an ordinary, manned Soyuz will fly unmanned. And not on March 13, as previously planned, but on February 20. The deadlines were postponed due to the need to have something like a "lifeboat" on board the space station, the role of which is often considered a docked manned spacecraft. It is believed that in case of unforeseen malfunctions on board the ISS, he will be able to evacuate astronauts from there.
Now two spacecraft are docked to the ISS — a reusable Endurance from SpaceX, which has already flown to the station in 2021, and a one-time Soyuz MS-22. The first one has four seats (although SpaceX originally planned seven of them, then NASA wanted to cut this opportunity to four), the second one has three. That is, until February 20, 2023, there is no possibility to completely evacuate the crew from the station in practice. In light of this, it is obvious that NASA's decision to reduce the capabilities of SpaceX spacecraft to transport people was not entirely far-sighted.
So far, the only means capable of removing people from the ISS is Endurance from SpaceX. But due to the well-known NASA decision, there are now not enough places on it to take out the entire crew of the station at once / ©Wikimedia Commons Yuri Borisov, in his video statement, noted that the Roscosmos commission also considered a scenario when the Soyuz MS-23 would fly to the ISS with one cosmonaut on board.
But this option was rejected. Since the ship has never flown in this mode, it would have to be redone and certified again for this. Then he would not have got to the ISS earlier than March.
In order not to multiply the risks, they preferred the unmanned version of the Soyuz flight to the station. It is worth noting that when choosing a flight with one cosmonaut on board, there would be no possibility to evacuate the entire crew of the ISS even after the arrival of Soyuz MS-23 there. Consequently, the decision adopted by the commission looks largely uncontested.
