In any case, before Russia could embark on a new station, Roscosmos must first launch Nauka, a science module, to the ISS later this year it was conceived more than 2 decades ago but has been grounded by technical flaws for the past 8 years. "The biggest ISS achievement is not technology, but cooperation between countries," he says. And for Andrey Ionin, a member of the Russian Academy of Cosmonautics who favors international projects, a new station would represent a step backward. Rogozin later added that the new station, which does not have a name yet, could be based on one of the modules initially planned for the ISS.įor the moment, a new Russian space station-which would be a successor to the Salyut and Mir stations launched in the 1970s and '80s-seems like a distant prospect. "Pauses are deadly for human spaceflight," he wrote in a Facebook post. Seemingly downplaying Borisov's remarks this week, Dmitry Rogozin, who leads Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, said on Monday that Russia would not pull out of the ISS until the proposed new station becomes functional. He predicted a swift decline for the ISS in the next 5 years and said Russia should prioritize building a new station. In November 2020, Vladimir Solovyov, flight director for the Russian module, caused a stir with remarks at a meeting of the Russian Academy of Sciences. It's not the first sign of Russian dissatisfaction with the ISS. But it reiterated that the ISS has run well past its original life span, and its condition "leaves much to be desired." "A technical inspection is needed, and then we can make a decision and inform our partners," the statement said. On 18 April, Russia 1, a state TV channel, reported that Borisov told a meeting chaired by President Vladimir Putin, "We need to honestly inform our partners about leaving the ISS in 2025." In a statement to newswires released later that day, Borisov's office clarified his remarks and backtracked from the date. "ISS partners would have a really hard time keeping the station functional without Russia," says Vitaly Egorov, an industry observer, writer, and former spokesperson for Dauria Aerospace, a Russian company. efforts to keep it operating until the end of the decade. This week, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yury Borisov suggested Russia would back away from the ISS as early as 2025 to pursue a national space station.Īlthough he and other officials have since backpedaled from such a concrete date for withdrawal, Russian skepticism over the future of the ISS could complicate U.S. Cracks are also appearing in the international alliance that keeps the station going. The 20-year-old International Space Station (ISS) is showing its age: Last month, cosmonauts patched up cracks in a Russian module that were thought to be the source of minor air leaks.
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