re: 2 Astronauts Survive Russian Rocket Failure on their way to ISS

In regards to the early space program, there was a launch abort on Gemini VI in 1965. The engines ignited, but then abruptly shut down after a couple of seconds. Commander Wally Schirra had his hand on the abort handle, which would have ejected the two astronauts out of the capsule like a jet fighter. He decided not to pull it, which was a good things because 1.) it was a shite escape system that they likely would not have survived, and 2.) it allowed everything to be re-set quickly, which allowed Germini VI to launch three days later, in time to rendezvous with Germini VII in orbit. This was the first time the United States had two spacecraft in orbit at the same time.

I know there have been a handful of launch pad aborts with the space shuttle, where the engines were about to ignite or did ignite then were cut off.

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That shows how much technology has advanced; I can’t imagine that would have been a survivable incident back when space travel was an event.

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The Saturn V had abort modes to save the crew from the moment they locked the door to orbit. How high and fast they were moving would determine the nature of the abort and how and where they'd get back to the ground. Barring a catastrophic explosion after the Launch Escape System was jettisoned, the crew would survive most emergencies. Before the LES was jettisoned, even explosions were survivable, as the vehicle's computer would sense an explosion and trigger the LES rockets to pull the crew away from an exploding launch vehicle.

Also, the Soyuz rocket system that failed is older than the Saturn V.

Crew safety was built into those rockets. You have to get into the ho-hum of the Space Shuttle before you start to really get unsurvivable situations due to launch vehicle failure.

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The Challenger was a rocket failure as well, no?

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SRB. Solid Rocket Booster is what Challenger had go wrong (O-ring seals between segments).

Soyuz is liquid fueled using RP-1/LOX.

Same but different. For one thing..once an SRB is lit...you can't stop it....you can split the case down the side (det cord) but that's a destructive means only available on the pad. Liquid fueled....you can command a valve closed or shut down the engine.