A space rocket misfires

ON OCTOBER 11TH two travellers to the International Space Station became the first astronauts to be rescued in mid-flight by a spacecraft’s escape system. Their Soyuz launch rocket got into trouble when jettisoning its first stage. Shortly afterwards, the escape system’s rocket pulled the capsule containing Alexey Ovchinin and Nick Hague free, and the pair landed safely in Kazakhstan, about 400km from the launch pad in Baikonur. Crewed Soyuz missions are now suspended. Since Soyuz was the only way to reach the space station, its current crew may have to return to Earth in the lone capsule now attached to it, leaving it abandoned.