The Russian made Soyuz TMA-19M spacecraft is the first flown, human-rated spacecraft to be acquired by the United Kingdom. This is the actual spacecraft that took astronauts Yuri Malenchenko, Tim Kopra and Britain’s Tim Peake up to the ISS in 2015 and then returned them safely to the Earth the following year. It was Peake’s first spaceflight, Kopra’s 2nd and Yuri Malenchenko’s 5th. It was the first time two ‘Tims’ had shared a space mission! Their spacecraft flew through Earth’s atmosphere at 17,000 miles per hour and temperatures of more than 1500°C, leaving its outer surface melted and charred.

Spaceflight is extremely dangerous; the first manned Soyuz mission ended in tragedy when it crashed to Earth killing cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. But Soyuz is now a stalwart of human spaceflight.

It was designed in the early 1960s as a three-person replacement to the single seater Vostok. Soyuz (‘union’ in Russian), unlike its predecessor, would be capable of subtle manoeuvring, rendezvousing and docking with other spacecraft. It would have been capable of lunar missions – an unmanned version called Zond did just that in 1968, the first spacecraft to travel around the Moon and back to Earth.

Now, Soyuz is the only means of ferrying humans to and from the ISS.

During the descent, the spacecraft deployed its parachute, fired its retrorockets and hit the Kazakhstan steppe on 18 June 2016.

ESA Astronaut Tim Peake said:
“You do become very attached to your spacecraft because it definitely does save your life, and I’m absolutely delighted that my Soyuz spacecraft, the TMA-19M, is going to be returning here to the UK and may serve, hopefully, as inspiration for our next generation of scientists and engineers.”

At the peak of the crisis, the flight director for the Russian segment of the ISS Vladimir Soloviev, himself a veteran of two space missions and a towering figure in the Russian space establishment, called on the crew, essentially jumping over both, the head of the on-duty team, SRP, and the chief communications officer. Although Soloviev is well known for his hands-on management style, critics charged that his involvement could place an undue sense of urgency on Malenchenko, at a time when a calm and collected response was needed. In any case, Malenchenko failed to do something he had done hundreds of times in the simulator, critics charged. Fortunately, within minutes after the near collision, Malenchenko was able to stabilize the spacecraft and complete the second manual docking attempt successfully.

Engineers are now analyzing all the available telemetry, as well as video and audio data in order to recreate the exact sequence of events and to model the Soyuz' approach trajectory during the botched docking attempt.

During the rendezvous process and after docking, controllers at the Russian mission control center in Korolev reported that they had not received necessary telemetry to monitor the mission.

The hatches between the transport ship and the station were opened at 22:58 Moscow Time (2:58 p.m. EST) on December 15, around half an hour later than scheduled.

Although there was no immediate official explanation for the aborted automated rendezvous between the Soyuz TMA-19M and the ISS, a commentator with the Novosti Kosmonavtiki magazine quickly narrowed down a culprit in the failure of the DPO-B No. 20 attitude-control thruster. This small engine is a part of the two independent engine clusters known as Circuit 1 and Circuit 2. Distributed around the ship's instrument module, PAO, both groups of small engines are used to fine-tune the spacecraft's orientation in space and to conduct low-thrust maneuvers. The particular engine provides a sideway thrust along -Y axis in the ship's coordinate system.

As the available video and audio footage reveals, at a distance of around 17 meters from the station, an alarm sounded in the Soyuz's cockpit, while the overlay display on the rendezvous camera showed "No SDK (combustion chamber pressure or valve signal) along -Y axis (K1B)." The K1B likely stands for Collector 1 (Manifold 1). That alarm was followed by another warning, which can be translated as "Total failure of the K1B manifold." In addition, the "A: DPOB 20" message, indicating a problem with the particular thruster and the numeric code for the failure type was also displayed.

Immediately thereafter, the Soyuz began backing away from the station still under the automated control. Malenchenko reported to mission control that the crew received the DPOB 20-type failure.

For a reason yet to be explained, the automated system apparently failed to switch to a backup circuit available just for such a contingency.

After switching to manual controls, it took the Soyuz commander two attempts to put the spacecraft into right orientation and complete the docking. During the first try, the spacecraft began a seemingly faster-than-normal approach to the station. It also appeared that the spacecraft made a sudden sideway turn just meters from the docking port, though a further evaluation indicated that the spacecraft might've been out of alignment from the outset and its wrong position became more obvious as the spacecraft approached.

Fortunately, Malenchenko quickly managed to stabilize the spacecraft, restore its alignment with a docking port on the MIM1 Rassvet module and complete the second manual docking attempt.

Shortly after docking, Malenchenko explained mission control that during his first manual approach attempt he could not see the docking port clear enough and only realized the problem at the last minute.

According to the Novosti Kosmonavtiki magazine, a similar problem with DPO thrusters also prevented an automated docking of the Progress M-05M cargo ship in 2010 and required the crew onboard the station to use the remote control to complete the process.