Russia gains edge in space race as US bows out
Jul 5, 2011 3:03:27 GMT -5
Post by PrisonerOfHope on Jul 5, 2011 3:03:27 GMT -5
Russia gains edge in space race as US shuttle bows out
Jul 3 04:28 PM US/Eastern
As the United States winds down its shuttle programme in a symbolic twist in a long-running space rivalry, Russia will gain complete control of access to the International Space Station.
The Russian space agency plays down any triumphalism, but US astronauts will remain dependent on Russia for access to the ISS at least until 2015 and will have to pay for seats in its Soyuz space capsules.
"We cannot say that we have won the space race, but simply that we have reached the end of a certain stage," the deputy head of the Russian space agency, Vitaly Davydov, said in an interview.
On July 8, four US astronauts will board the Atlantis shuttle for its last flight, wrapping up a three-decade-long programme in which the United States took turns to ferry supplies and crews to the ISS with Russia's Proton and Soyuz rockets.
Henceforth, Washington will have to pay $51 million per seat in Russia's space capsules until a new crew vehicle can be built by private companies, which US space agency NASA has estimated could be between 2015 and 2020.
Davydov of the space agency Roskosmos rejected any talk of rivalry, however, emphasizing that the ISS was primarily a story of successful international cooperation.
"I cannot think today of another international space project that is so effective in its scale, its significance and its results as the ISS," he said.
While Russia gains a symbolic victory, it will be a costly one, with the obligation to build more space ships to go back and forth to the ISS eating up a budget that could be spent on other projects.
Unlike the reusable NASA shuttles, the Russian Soyuz space capsules are single-use, except for the section in which spacemen return to Earth.
The situation is "not very convenient because it lays a heavy burden on Roskosmos's production capacities," space industry expert Igor Marinin told AFP.
Roskosmos this year declared its budget as $3 billion, a fraction of NASA's massive $18.5 billion budget.
And it has faced embarrassing setbacks, including the failure of several satellite launches that led to the sacking of the long-serving space chief Anatoly Perminov in April.
The country's space industry has also drawn smirks with a clunky experiment simulating a trip to Mars, in which volunteers are spending more than a year confined at a Moscow research institute and "landed" in a specially designed sand pit.
To recoup its costs, Roskosmos hopes to build a stronger presence in the commercial space market, such as satellite launches, its newly appointed chief Vladimir Popovkin said at the Saint Petersburg Economic Forum last month.
"The goal is to take up a suitable position in the commercial market: about 10 to 12 percent" of a market worth $300 billion per year, Popovkin said.
"This is one of the few things in our country that is competitive on the international level."
While Russia holds 40 percent of the world's space launches and constructs 20 percent of its space craft, currently "its share in the space business is unfairly small, not more than three percent," Popovkin said.
Rest of story at link:
www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.929e9c254b0a78971b4b58b7a3749ac8.241&show_article=1
Jul 3 04:28 PM US/Eastern
As the United States winds down its shuttle programme in a symbolic twist in a long-running space rivalry, Russia will gain complete control of access to the International Space Station.
The Russian space agency plays down any triumphalism, but US astronauts will remain dependent on Russia for access to the ISS at least until 2015 and will have to pay for seats in its Soyuz space capsules.
"We cannot say that we have won the space race, but simply that we have reached the end of a certain stage," the deputy head of the Russian space agency, Vitaly Davydov, said in an interview.
On July 8, four US astronauts will board the Atlantis shuttle for its last flight, wrapping up a three-decade-long programme in which the United States took turns to ferry supplies and crews to the ISS with Russia's Proton and Soyuz rockets.
Henceforth, Washington will have to pay $51 million per seat in Russia's space capsules until a new crew vehicle can be built by private companies, which US space agency NASA has estimated could be between 2015 and 2020.
Davydov of the space agency Roskosmos rejected any talk of rivalry, however, emphasizing that the ISS was primarily a story of successful international cooperation.
"I cannot think today of another international space project that is so effective in its scale, its significance and its results as the ISS," he said.
While Russia gains a symbolic victory, it will be a costly one, with the obligation to build more space ships to go back and forth to the ISS eating up a budget that could be spent on other projects.
Unlike the reusable NASA shuttles, the Russian Soyuz space capsules are single-use, except for the section in which spacemen return to Earth.
The situation is "not very convenient because it lays a heavy burden on Roskosmos's production capacities," space industry expert Igor Marinin told AFP.
Roskosmos this year declared its budget as $3 billion, a fraction of NASA's massive $18.5 billion budget.
And it has faced embarrassing setbacks, including the failure of several satellite launches that led to the sacking of the long-serving space chief Anatoly Perminov in April.
The country's space industry has also drawn smirks with a clunky experiment simulating a trip to Mars, in which volunteers are spending more than a year confined at a Moscow research institute and "landed" in a specially designed sand pit.
To recoup its costs, Roskosmos hopes to build a stronger presence in the commercial space market, such as satellite launches, its newly appointed chief Vladimir Popovkin said at the Saint Petersburg Economic Forum last month.
"The goal is to take up a suitable position in the commercial market: about 10 to 12 percent" of a market worth $300 billion per year, Popovkin said.
"This is one of the few things in our country that is competitive on the international level."
While Russia holds 40 percent of the world's space launches and constructs 20 percent of its space craft, currently "its share in the space business is unfairly small, not more than three percent," Popovkin said.
Rest of story at link:
www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.929e9c254b0a78971b4b58b7a3749ac8.241&show_article=1
