The evacuation of astronauts from the Soyuz MS-25 spacecraft has begun: the launch was canceled at the last moment

Start was blocked by automation

Cosmonauts Oleg Novitsky, the first ever female cosmonaut from Belarus Marina Vasilevskaya and American Tracy Dyson are preparing to evacuate from the Soyuz MS-25 spacecraft. This was reported by a MK source in the space industry.

Let us recall that today the state commission authorized the refueling of the Soyuz-2.1a launch vehicle with the Soyuz MS-25 manned spacecraft and its launch from the 31st site was scheduled for 16:21:18 Moscow time.

However, literally within a few seconds the start was canceled – the automatic system worked.

Currently, the masts supporting the launch vehicle have been returned to their place, and the elevator for evacuating astronauts has been raised to the ship. Other reserve dates will be scheduled for the restart. Perhaps it will be Sunday, March 24th. According to experts, such a situation where cosmonauts, who were already a minute from the launch, had to return, has never happened in the history of Russian manned cosmonautics. NASA has had similar cancellations, including due to weather.

It is too early to talk about the reason that led to the cancellation of the launch, a source in the space industry told MK. “There are a lot of parameters, but these are not weather conditions.”