A last-minute mission has been organized to rescue three astronauts stuck in orbit on the International Space Station.
The plan is being put together by Russia, which announced that it would be speeding up its scheduled rocket launch to aid the astronauts and bring them back to Earth.
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The crew, made up of Russian cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Peteli, and US astronaut Francisco Rubio, was stranded after their capsule, the Soyuz MS-22, sprang a leak last month.
The Guardian reports that the leak was caused by a micrometeoroid that perforated the docked ship.
While the piece of rock was small, it traveled fast and caused great harm to the capsule.
The accident resulted in radiator coolant spreading into space and the astronauts having to abort their spacewalk.
According to Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, the leak caused no immediate threat to astronauts but it raised the temperatures of the cabin and left the MS-22 unit unfit for use.
The ISS, a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, has only one remaining escape pod, capable of fitting in four passengers while there are seven at the station.
Roscosmos announced that it would be moving up its March launch to February 20.
The launch of the unit, the Soyuz MS-23, would be used to bring back the stranded astronauts back to Earth.
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The space agency shared that if the situation were to worsen at the space station, it would consider putting a plan together to use the damaged Soyuz MS-22 to bring the astronauts back to Earth.
If things go according to plan, the damaged unit would be returned to Earth once the new ship and the replacing crew arrive at the ISS.
While tensions between Russia and the US remain high, space is one of the realms in which the two nations continue to collaborate.
