About 383 seconds into a launch that started with a flawless liftoff, Roscosmos lost contact with the Soyuz-U rocket carrying the unpiloted Progress MS-04 cargo spacecraft bound for the International Space Station.
A few hours later, the Russian space agency reported the third stage of the carrier rocket shut down early, preventing the Progress from achieving orbit. The vehicle burned up in the atmosphere on the way back toward Earth.
Read MoreThanksgiving is just a normal day on the International Space Station; however, the two NASA astronauts will share the tradition of the American holiday with the rest of the crew during their evening meal time.
Of the six members of the Expedition 50 crew, three countries are represented: the United States, Russia, and France. Only the U.S. celebrates Thanksgiving; however, as an international crew, they celebrate each other’s holidays.
Read MoreAfter spending a month attached to the International Space Station, Orbital ATK’s OA-5 Cygnus was detached and released by the robotic Canadarm2 in the morning hours of Nov. 21.
The S.S. Alan Poindexter, as the cargo ship is named, was unberthed from the Earth-facing port of the Unity module and moved to about 10 meters below the outpost. A couple hours later, at 8:22 a.m. EST (13:22 GMT), astronaut Shane Kimbrough commanded Canadarm2 to release the craft.
Read MoreAfter spending two days catching up to the International Space Station, the crew of Soyuz MS-03 docked their spacecraft with the orbiting complex at 4:58 p.m. EST (21:58 GMT) Nov. 19.
The trio – NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, and European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet – docked with the Rassvet module of the ISS. They joined the ongoing Expedition 50 crew, which includes NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough (current commander of the laboratory) and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrei Borisenko.
Read MoreOn a clear and cold Kazakh morning, three space flyers launched atop a Soyuz rocket in their Soyuz MS-03 spacecraft on a two-day flight bound for the International Space Station. The trio will spend about six months in space.
Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet, and NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson launched to space at 2:20 a.m. local Kazakh time Nov. 18 (3:20 p.m. EST / 20:20 GMT Nov. 17) from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Read MoreEarlier this year, Roscosmos announced it would be reducing its crew on each International Space Station expedition from three to two. This means only five people will participate in each expedition as opposed to the normal six. As such, NASA has updated the 2017 crew assignments for the outpost.
Read MoreThe second half of 2016 has been rough for International Space Station mission planning. All of the visiting vehicles that service the outpost have had some delay or another.
First, in early August the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency announced their Kounotori 6 spacecraft would be postponed from its Sept. 30, 2016 launch date due to a "slight leak" found in the pluming of the cargo ship.
Read MoreOn Nov. 2, 2000, the first three people to inhabit the International Space Station arrived in their Soyuz TM-31 spacecraft.
The trio – NASA astronaut William Sheperd and Russian cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev – docked to the aft port of the Zvezda service module. At the time, the ISS consisted of only three pressurized modules.
Read MoreThree space-flyers boarded their Soyuz spacecraft, undocked, deorbited and landed back on Earth early Monday morning local Kazakh time.
Soyuz MS-01 landed on the Step of Kazakhstan at 9:58 a.m. Oct. 30 (03:58 GMT / 11:58 p.m. EDT Oct. 29). Returning to Earth after 115 days in space were Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin, Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi and NASA astronaut Kate Rubins.
Read MoreWith the Oct. 21 docking of Soyuz MS-02 to the International Space Station's Poisk module, the crew size for the football field-sized orbiting outpost returned to six, albeit for only about two weeks.
Launched Oct. 19 from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, three members of Expedition 49 took a 34-orbit route to catch up with the ISS and test new equipment on the upgraded Soyuz-MS variant.
Read MoreOrbital Velocity is designed to be "living time capsule" about the International Space Station.
This project is an attempt to bridge an information gap between space agencies and companies, as well as a public that supports space endeavors with their tax dollars. Despite the importance of the space station, the general public doesn't always know what is happening aboard this amazing complex on a regular basis. Research being conducted isn't always readily available and what information is out there can sometimes be difficult to understand. Some people aren't even aware there is an active space program, let alone a space station.
Orbital Velocity hopes to change that by building a database of information through blogs, a website, small videos and longer documentary-like series'.
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