Specialists of the Moscow Region Control Center TsNIIMASH (part of the state corporation “Roskosmos”) December 3, 2021 at 10:58 Moscow time held an unscheduled correction of the height of the orbit of the International Space Station for evasion from “space garbage” – a fragment of the American rocket PEGASUS carrier launched from the United States in 1994.
All operations were full accordance with the calculations of Russian specialists of the ballistic service. For this maneuver, engines of the MS-18 Progress Cargo Ship are used, which worked 160.9 seconds. The impetus was minus 0.3 m / s. After the corrective maneuver, the height of the station orbits has previously decreased by 310 meters.
Currently, the specialists of the Ballistic-navigation provision of the TsNIIMASH Central Commissions are studying telemetry information. According to the results, the updated parameters of the ISS orbit after maneuvers will be reported.
This correction did not affect the launch plans from the Baikonur cosmodrome and docking from the ISS of the piloted ship “Union MS-20” on December 8, 2021.
According to the information of the main information and analytical center of the automated warning system for dangerous situations in the near-emblem space of TsNiyimash, the ISS would close at a minimum distance of 3 km with a fragment of the destroyed step at 13:33 Moscow time.