The Russian space program had problem after problem
The ISS mishap with the Nauka module was hardly the only incident involving the Russian space program this year. A new leak in the Russian Zvezda ISS service module was detected in July, and in August, a senior Russian space official warned of cracks on the aging Zarya module of the ISS, saying this is “bad” and that the “fissures will begin to spread over time.” A smoke alarm went off in the Zvezda module in September, as the smell of burnt plastic wafted through the orbital outpost. No reason was given, but the smoke coincided with the autonomous charging of the station’s batteries. Russian state-owned media spread a rumor accusing a NASA astronaut of deliberately drilling a hole in a Russian module back in 2018, and Roscosmos said nothing to quell the accusations.
