Progress M-53
Encyclopedia
Progress M-53, identified by NASA
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

 as Progress 18 or 18P, was a Progress spacecraft used to resupply the International Space Station
International Space Station
The International Space Station is a habitable, artificial satellite in low Earth orbit. The ISS follows the Salyut, Almaz, Cosmos, Skylab, and Mir space stations, as the 11th space station launched, not including the Genesis I and II prototypes...

. It was a Progress-M
Progress-M
Progress-M , also known as Progress 7K-TGM, is a Russian, previously Soviet spacecraft which is used to resupply space stations. It is a variant of the Progress spacecraft, originally built in the late 1980s as a modernised version of the Progress 7K-TG spacecraft, using new systems developed for...

 11F615A55 spacecraft, with the serial number
Serial number
A serial number is a unique number assigned for identification which varies from its successor or predecessor by a fixed discrete integer value...

 353.

Progress M-53 was launched by a Soyuz-U
Soyuz-U
The Soyuz-U launch vehicle is an improved version of the original Soyuz LV. Soyuz-U is part of the R-7 family of rockets based on the R-7 Semyorka missile. Members of this rocket family were designed by the TsSKB design bureau and constructed at the Progress Factory in Samara, Russia....

 carrier rocket from Site 1/5
Gagarin's Start
Gagarin's Start is a launch site at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, used for the Soviet space program and now managed by the Russian Federal Space Agency....

 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome
Baikonur Cosmodrome
The Baikonur Cosmodrome , also called Tyuratam, is the world's first and largest operational space launch facility. It is located in the desert steppe of Kazakhstan, about east of the Aral Sea, north of the Syr Darya river, near Tyuratam railway station, at 90 meters above sea level...

. Launch occurred at 23:09:34 GMT on 16 June 2005. The spacecraft docked with the Aft port of the Zvezda module at 00:41:31 GMT on 19 June. The docking was conducted using the backup TORU
TORU
TORU system is a manual docking system of Russian Soyuz and Progress spacecraft that serves as a backup to the automatic Kurs system . It was used on the Mir, Salyut and is currently used on the International Space Station...

 system, under the control of cosmonaut Sergei Krikalyov, due to a power failure at one of the spacecraft's ground control stations. It remained docked for three months before undocking at 10:25:57 GMT on 7 September 2005 to make way for Progress M-54
Progress M-54
Progress M-54, identified by NASA as Progress 19 or 19P, was a Progress spacecraft used to resupply the International Space Station. It was a Progress-M 11F615A55 spacecraft, with the serial number 354....

. It was deorbited at 13:26:00 GMT on 7 September 2005. The spacecraft burned up in the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...

, with any remaining debris landing in the ocean at around 14:12:40 GMT.

Progress M-53 carried supplies to the International Space Station, including food, water and oxygen for the crew and equipment for conducting scientific research.
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