Roughly 200 people are under medical observation, several hospitals are under quarantine, and dozens are in isolation in Russia following the unexplained death of an infectious disease researcher at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute of Siberia, in the town of Shelekhov, according to early reports of the situation on Sunday and Monday.

Researcher Darya Shipilova reportedly died last week from pneumonia of "unknown" cause, according to Rospotrebnadzor, a Russian public health agency.

Unconfirmed information regarding her death has swirled. Some reports have claimed she accidentally broke a test tube containing the plague pathogen, Yersinia pestis, on September 25. She subsequently fell ill, was admitted to a hospital September 29 with severe pneumonia and died overnight between October 1 and October 2.  The head of the Russian region that neighbors Irkutsk, Alexey Tsydenov, initially reported that she had died of plague but later altered his statement to say she "possibly" died of the disease.

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In what seems like an alternate universe in hindsight, Russia and the European Space Agency began discussing collaboration on next-generation crewed spacecraft two decades ago. Under the agreement, Europe would have provided a service module to power a crew capsule carrying up to six passengers.

Europe ultimately decided not to pursue a crewed spacecraft project at the time, and Russia's state-backed space corporation, Roscosmos, chose to move ahead with a crewed spacecraft on its own. This project—always seemingly more of a Potemkin village than an effort encompassing real hardware—has gone under various guises over the years:

• PPTS (Perspektivnaya Pilotiruemaya Transportnaya Sistema / Prospective Piloted Transport System): The initial conceptual project name used in 2009
• PTK NP (Pilotiruyemy Transportny Korabl Novogo Pokoleniya / New Generation Piloted Transport Ship): The official technical designation used until 2016
• Federatsiya (Federation): The official name chosen following a public contest and announced in January 2016
• Orel / Oryol (Eagle): A new name adopted in September 2019 when Roscosmos was under the control of Dmitry Rogozin

Actual hardware tests, maybe?

Beyond the name changes and a flood of renderings, after nearly 20 years of work, then, is anything actually happening with the Eagle spacecraft?

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