The orbit of the International Space Station (ISS) will be corrected by raising it by 2.15 kilometres, the Mission Control Centre said today.
“The maneouver will be carried out today using the thrusters of the Progress M-21M cargo spacecraft, which is currently docked with the station. The thrusters will be switched on at 7:45 GMT and will stay operational for 566.8 seconds (about 9.5 minutes),” the centre said.
The station will be raised to the altitude of 415.2 kilometres and the adjustment is made to ensure better docking conditions of the Soyuz TMA-13M spacecraft, which is scheduled to blast off from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan on May 28 to bring a new crew to the ISS.
Centre also said that the Progress M-21M docked with the orbital station on November 30. The docking operation was being carried out by means of the new approach system in an automatic mode.