"Russia looks to fill space travel gap"
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F3F234C8-9A83-40DA-A315-A577B1F5F02D.htm
Sunday 21 August 2005, 14:29 Makka Time, 11:29 GMT
The grounding of US space shuttles has left Russia
with a temporary monopoly on manned flight to the
International Space Station (ISS), and officials in
Moscow are crowing that whatever their cosmic taxis
lack in frills they make up for in high reliability
and low cost.
Mincing few words, space officials say Russia can make
three manned flights to the ISS between now and
February if needed, but they make clear that they
expect the United States to foot the bill for any
missions made necessary by scrapping of planned
shuttle flights.
Their price? $65 million - a fraction of the more than
$500 million for an average shuttle mission -
according to Alexei Krasnov, head of the Russian Space
Agency's manned spaceflight program.
For that money, a paying customer would get a Soyuz
rocket, the workhorse of Russian space transport, and
all accompanying launch, mission supervision and
return-trip services.
"We hope that American shuttles will resume regular
flights, and we are offering our NASA colleagues the
use of Soyuz as a rescue spaceship," Krasnov said on
Thursday at an aerospace trade exhibition outside
Moscow, a trade show that underscored Russia's prowess
in space exploration.
Russian and US space officials were planning to hash
things out in the coming weeks, taking into account
the disruption to the US shuttle mission schedule,
Krasnov said
Russian help
Russia was prepared to consider a variety of
scenarios. "Our counterparts from NASA will visit us
late August or early September, and we will then
discuss what services Russia can provide to deliver
cargoes and crews, and on what terms," Krasnov said.
Although China launched its first manned space mission
in 2003 and is reported to be preparing for a second
mission, possibly as early as October, Russia and the
United States are at present the only powers that
ferry humans to the ISS.
But NASA announced on Thursday that it was grounding
its shuttle fleet until at least March after a mishap
on the latest mission, and some experts have
speculated the US shuttles, central to the ISS
project, could be mothballed for good.
Even if US space officials conclude they need Russia's
help in space, Russian officials said, they may find
themselves constrained by US law itself, specifically
an amendment that bars US financial involvement in
Russian space projects due to Moscow's nuclear
cooperation with Iran.
Space projects
Russia is looking beyond partnership with the United
States for the future of its own manned space program,
setting its sights on a range of state-funded and
commercial projects, including a plan to send a rich
space tourist to orbit the moon.
The country's draft 2006 budget allocates more than
6.1 billion rubles (around $220 million) for the space
programme, a meagre sum compared with NASA's projected
$9.6 billion 2006 budget, but nonetheless a 160%
increase on this year's Russian space budget.
In addition to financing Russia's current space
presence, some of those funds are earmarked for
development of the country's own space shuttle, the
Clipper, a reusable manned space vehicle that Russia
plans to launch in 10 years.
Like the US space shuttles, the Clipper is designed to
carry people to and from space. Unlike the US space
shuttle, it doesn't pretend to be of use for anything
else and is a fraction of the size, a fraction of the
sophistication - and a fraction of the cost - of the
US vessel.
Agreement obligations
While US space planners wring their hands about what
to do next, Russian officials have been telegraphing
reminders that their ISS contractual obligations to
NASA expire next spring and that ferrying Americans to
space will not necessarily be a priority after that.
"Russia's obligations to its US partners will end in
the spring," Krasnov said. "A Soyuz rocket will then
take two Russian cosmonauts ... to the ISS. The third
place will be reserved either for a space tourist or
for an astronaut from the European Space Agency."
He said that although Europe does not have manned
space vehicles, it is scheduled to launch its first
ATV supply ship to the ISS early next year, signalling
that international presence in space will be
increasingly less reliant on the US program.
A Russian Space Agency source quoted by Interfax news
agency said this month that ISS member states are
planning to convene this autumn, possibly in Japan, to
lay out plans for the space station in light of
uncertainties about the US role in the project.
AFP
By
You can find this article at:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F3F234C8-9A83-40DA-A315-A577B1F5F02D.htm
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