Progress M-18 | |||||||||||
Mission Type: | Mir resupply | ||||||||||
Cospar Id: | 1993-034A | ||||||||||
Spacecraft Type: | Progress-M 11F615A55 | ||||||||||
Manufacturer: | NPO Energia | ||||||||||
Launch Mass: | 7250kg (15,980lb) | ||||||||||
Launch Date: | UTC | ||||||||||
Launch Rocket: | Soyuz-U2 | ||||||||||
Launch Site: | Baikonur Site 1/5 | ||||||||||
Disposal Type: | Deorbited | ||||||||||
Orbit Reference: | Geocentric | ||||||||||
Orbit Regime: | Low Earth | ||||||||||
Orbit Apoapsis: | [1] | ||||||||||
Orbit Inclination: | 51.6 degrees | ||||||||||
Apsis: | gee | ||||||||||
Docking: |
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Progress M-18 (Russian: Прогресс М-18|italic=yes) was a Russian cargo uncrewed spacecraft which was launched in 1993 to resupply the Mir space station.[2] The thirty-sixth of sixty four Progress spacecraft to visit Mir, it used the Progress-M 11F615A55 configuration,[3] and had the serial number 218.[4] It carried supplies including food, water and oxygen for the EO-13 crew aboard Mir, as well as equipment for conducting scientific research, and fuel for adjusting the station's orbit and performing manoeuvres.
Progress M-18 was launched at 06:41:47 GMT on 22 May 1993, atop a Soyuz-U2 carrier rocket flying from Site 1/5 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.[4] It was the last Progress spacecraft to be launched on a Soyuz-U2. Following two days of free flight, it docked with the Forward port of Mir's core module at 08:24:44 GMT on 24 May.[5] [6]
During the 40 days for which Progress M-18 was docked, Mir was in an orbit of around 388kmby390kmkm (241milesby240mileskm), inclined at 51.6 degrees.[1] Progress M-18 undocked from Mir at 15:58:16 GMT on 3 July; less than half an hour before Soyuz TM-17 docked with the port which it had vacated. It was deorbited around a day later, to a destructive reentry over the Pacific Ocean.[1] [5] Before undocking, a VBK-Raduga capsule launched aboard Progress M-17 had been installed on Progress M-18, and this separated once the deorbit burn was complete. The capsule landed successfully at 17:13 GMT.[5]