Roscosmos State Corporation and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the United States agreed that the crew of the damaged Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft will return to Earth on the Soyuz MS-23, which will go to the International Space Station next month. This information was confirmed by the state corporation.

“Roscosmos and the space agencies of the ISS partner countries have taken measures to ensure the safe return of the station crew to Earth in the event of an accident before the arrival of the Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft. Due to an emergency situation with the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft, its crew — Sergey Prokopiev, Dmitry Petelin and Francisco Rubio — will return to Earth on the Soyuz MS-23, which is supposed to dock to the ISS in an unmanned mode on February 22,” — said in a message that was published on the Telegram channel of the state corporation Roscosmos.

It is noted that the systems of the ISS and the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft are operating normally, but in the event of an accident, the crew may need an emergency evacuation before the Soyuz MS-23 arrives. Francisco Rubio's seat will be temporarily transferred from Soyuz MS-22 to Crew Dragon. The transfer work is scheduled for January 17–18. If an emergency evacuation is necessary, Rubio will return to Earth on an American ship, and Russian cosmonauts on the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft. After Soyuz MS-23 arrives at the ISS, the seats of all three crew members will be moved to it.

Recall that in mid-December, a depressurization of the circuit of the thermal regime maintenance system on the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft was recorded. It was reported that the temperature in the instrument and assembly compartment increased to 40 °C, and in the living room - up to 30 °C. The reason for the damage to the cooling system was a hole with a diameter of 0.8 mm, which arose due to a collision with a micrometeoroid.