In what was the second successive failure for the Russian space program, the upper stage of a Soyuz-U booster carrying an unmanned Russian Progress supply ship reportedly malfunctioned, and shut down within barely five minutes of its recent launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Revealing that the launch mishap sent nearly 2.9 tons of space station supplies and equipment crashing back to Earth, NASA officials said that it appears like the ship came down in the Altai Republic – which is part of the Russian Federation – close to the border with Mongolia.

Since the contact with Soyuz-U upper stage was lost five minutes and 20 seconds after liftoff, engineers will apparently be racking their brains over what went amiss, chiefly because of its similarity with the third stage used by Russia's manned Soyuz spacecraft --- more so as the launch of the next manned Soyuz mission has been scheduled for September 22.

Noting that the Russian cargo rocket launch debacle has “implications to the vehicle on orbit and the crew as well,” Mike Suffredini - manager of the space station program at the Johnson Space Center in Houston – said: “Our Russian colleagues... will immediately begin to assess the data that's available to try to determine root cause.”

About the loss of supplies, Suffredini said that enough supplies have already been stored on board the space station, and added: “We're in a good position logistically to withstand this loss of supplies. And in fact, I would tell you we can go several months without a resupply vehicle if that becomes necessary.”