Progress

Mission Profile

Progress is Russia's uncrewed cargo spacecraft for resupplying space stations, first launched on 20 January 1978 and derived from the Soyuz spacecraft with the crew module replaced by a pressurized cargo section and additional propellant tanks for station refueling. Operated continuously for over four decades across more than 90 missions to Salyut, Mir, and the International Space Station, Progress has delivered food, water, fuel, equipment, and scientific hardware with extraordinary reliability. Unlike American commercial cargo vehicles, Progress is expendable and cannot return cargo to Earth, instead deorbiting loaded with waste for destructive reentry. Progress MS, the current production variant introduced in 2015, incorporates digital avionics and improved rendezvous systems identical to those in the Soyuz MS crew vehicle.