Nauka’s turbulent story
On the morning of November 20th, 1998, Zarya, the first module of the ISS, took to the skies aboard a Proton-K rocket, from Site 81/23 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
The launch was a complete success. However, Russian officials knew the risk this launch had. So to be safe, they decided to build a backup for Zarya. Roscosmos, not really knowing what to do with the backup, decided in 2004 to launch it, and named it “Nauka” (Russian for science). At first they set the launch date to be 2007.
Problems arise
Nothing really happened until 2013, when launch had already been delayed from 2007 to 2014. Very little is known about these delays.
(Credit: RussianSpaceWeb)
The module was sent to RKK Energia, a contractor, for testing. While Nauka underwent testing in late 2013, they found leaks in the fueling valve for the propulsion system and contamination. The leak was then traced to metallic particles inside the valve.
And if you thought that was the worst it could get, after observations they found that not only was one valve contaminated, the whole propulsion system was filled with those tiny metal particles.
There are even rumors saying the engineers who were sewing off pipelines - back in the days when it was still a Zarya backup - thought the entire thing was going to end up getting scrapped.
The decision was made to basically dismantle the entire propulsion system, replacing everything. However, there was a major issue with that: they were going to have to change components which were built around 20 years prior, so there were 6 components whose factories literally didn’t exist!
Roscosmos delayed the launch to June 2014. By late 2013, a launch date of November 2015 started appearing in NASA documents.
On December 31st, 2014 Nauka was shipped over to its manufacturer, Khrunichev, to make repairs.
(Nauka training mockup, credit: NASA)
In April, the launch had already been delayed to 2017. All propellant lines on Nauka’s exterior had to be changed. Officials got so annoyed by all of these delays, that they even considered canceling the module.
As 2017 began, issues such as workers having complications cleaning contaminated tanks began to push the launch to June 2018.
These tanks were so old that their components were no longer being produced. A study was made which concluded that bringing them back to production could require an estimated 50.000 work hours, deeming it unfeasible.
Being desperate for ideas, they even studied cutting Proton’s payload fairing to make space for other tanks. At the end, they took some similar leftover tanks for Nauka and called it a day.
Hold on… What if those tanks were also contaminated?
Tests were made, which indicated tiny metal particles in every single tank.
They went with the only option they had, which was to do one GIANT repair to the original tanks. The launch date is now October 2018.
A spacecraft that was planned to fly 11 years ago was still being tested, with an endlessly-delayed launch date.
The launch date was then changed to March 2019, because of more issues… Or that’s until the Kremlin got angry and requested a launch before the end of 2018.
Political pressure did not work and in 2018, it ended up getting delayed to October 2019, as tanks were still getting repaired.
(Credit: RKK Energia)
Fast-forward to 2020 and Proton is shipped to its launch site (Baikonur) for testing. Launch, which was scheduled for middle-2020, was then delayed to 2021 due to COVID.
Launch preparations begin
(Credit: Roscosmos)
After 13 years of constant delays, Nauka arrived at Baikonur in August 2020. Pre-launch tests then happened, which, for the first time in the entire program, seemed to be entirely successful!
A few small delays later, a launch date was set. 21st of July 2021. That was the day where all the years of hard work would get together.
July 19th saw a perfect wet dress rehearsal and things were looking great for a launch 48 hours later.
Better late than never, right?
(Credit: NASA)
Having almost been canceled several times and being endlessly delayed, Nauka took to the skies on the evening of the 21st of July, 2021.
The Proton rocket which had waited patiently for this launch inserted the module into a perfect orbit flawlessly - after all, they had had 17 years to build that rocket.
But on Nauka, problems hadn’t stopped yet. As it made its way to the ISS, it experienced several anomalies, including loss of telemetry and issues with the propulsion system.
Basically, the low pressure tanks were now high pressure! Teams quickly developed a solution to use the high pressure tanks to do the initial maneuvers, which would lower the pressure of the other tanks.
But this solution also came with its own problem: They only had one attempt to dock. Docking fails in the first attempt and all the hard work technicians had poured into the project is now gone. But sadly, it was a risk they had to take.
That wasn’t the end…
(Credit: NASA)
Nauka made a perfect docking with the space station at 13:29:01 UTC. Mission control could now breathe again, knowing Nauka was safely berthed with the space station and almost nothing could go wrong…
Three hours after docking, the module randomly activated its thrusters. Mission Control got to work on a solution but, eight minutes later, the acceptable limits for deviation got surpassed. They proceeded to declare a “spacecraft emergency”, for the first time in the entire ISS program. To be specific, the emergency given was a “Loss of Attitude Emergency”.
The space agency gave the ISS top priority on its TRDS (Tracking and Data Relay Satellite) network. Emergency control of the station was given to the Zvezda module, to at least try to correct the issue.
As a note, the thrusters could not be turned off, as it could only receive commands from Russian ground stations, which won’t be passed over for an hour.
The Cupolas windows also got shuttered, in case something could start flying off.
Emergency control later got handed over to a Progress resupply vehicle, in this case, the Progress MS-17.
Half an hour later, the engines finally shut down.
Within three quarters of an hour, the station was back under control.
Aftermath
So you may be wondering… Why did Nauka just turn on its engines for no reason?
A commission, chaired by NASA administrator Bill Nelson, along with international partners Roscosmos, ESA and JAXA was formed.
The commission finished their work in practically a day, as they discovered a faulty command had been sent from Russian controllers. To put it simply, it made the module believe it was docking again.
Conclusion
(Credit: NASA)
Nauka has had a long, turbulent story ever since it stopped being Zarya's backup. There were constant delays for more or less 14 years, and after all those years it still encountered problems while in space.
In the end, the station made more than one and a half rotations. According to NASA, the crew was never in risk during the anomaly.
Today, Nauka continues doing science for the progress of humanity.
