• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Russians Excited About Bush's Space Plan

Posted on: Thursday, 15 January 2004, 06:00 CST

President Bush's plan to send men to the moon, Mars and beyond excited Russian space officials and designers, who voiced hopes Thursday for winning a lucrative share in the U.S. program and boosting the sagging status of their own.

NASA has already sent the Russian Aerospace Agency its proposals concerning cooperation in moon and Mars missions, said deputy chief Nikolai Moiseyev, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency. He did not give details of the U.S. proposals but said Russia has plentiful know-how to share.

Bush's plan could be a chance for the beleaguered Russian space program to get much-needed cash and to revive its prestige. The Soviet Union sent the first satellite and first man into space, but the Russian program fell on hard times after the 1991 Soviet collapse.

The program gained new prominence when, after the suspension of the space shuttle program following the Columbia disaster, Russian Soyuz craft became the only way to ferry astronauts to and from the international space station. Severe funding problems persist, however.

Despite the money shortage, its scientists have done a lot of new research on interplanetary missions, said space agency spokesman Vyacheslav Mikhailichenko.

"Even though our space engineers lacked money to build new hardware, they have done a lot of prospective design work," Mikhailichenko told The Associated Press. "We have preserved and developed our scientific potential."

Like other Russian space officials, Mikhailichenko held out hope that the United States will tap Russian know-how while building future spacecraft. "It would be unfeasible to do such work alone," he said.

The European Union also hoped Bush's space initiative would be open to international participation.

"One thing is clear, Europe would be a solid, credible and respected partner," said Philippe Busquin, the EU's research commissioner. "The exploration of space is a domain that would need the strong international scientific cooperation."

Mikhailichenko said Russia's giant Energiya booster rocket, with a payload of about 110 tons, could be useful for lunar and interplanetary missions. The Energiya program has been dormant in recent years due to the money crunch and the lack of suitable mission.

Mikhailichenko said Energiya facilities have been preserved at Baikonur, the Central Asian launchpad used by Russia for manned space flights.

Meanwhile, Russian space designers said they could quickly develop spacecraft for both lunar and Martian missions if they have money.

Roald Kremnev, a deputy head of NPO Lavochkin company that built the Soviet Lunokhod rover that traipsed across the moon in 1970, said it could build its successor in mere two or three years for just $21 million, ITAR-Tass reported.

Kremnev said that his company could make spacecraft capable of flying unmanned missions to the moon, including robots capable of building temporary housing there.

Another space designer, Leonid Gorshkov of the RKK Energiya company that builds Soyuz and Progress spacecraft, says it has designed a spacecraft that can carry a crew to Mars as early as 2014 for $15 billion.

Gorshkov told ITAR-Tass that the 77-ton spacecraft modeled on the Russian Zvezda module for the space station could be assembled in orbit from components delivered by Proton booster rockets.

Increased involvement with NASA could divert Russia from working with China's advancing manned space program. Russia has sold space technology to China and trained two Chinese air force pilots at the Star City cosmonaut training center outside Moscow.

Meanwhile, Russian space officials remain unperturbed about the U.S. plans to shift the emphasis from the space station to moon and interplanetary missions and retire its shuttle fleet by around 2010.

Mikhail Sinelshchikov, the head of Russia's manned space program, told the Interfax news agency that the United States had pledged to fulfill all its obligations under the 16-nation project. "The program and plans are still valid, the commitments are the same for the international partners," Sinelshchikov said.

Turning to future Mars missions, Russian designers are already thinking about the composition of the crew. Gorshkov said that it would likely consist of four to six men, but he was hesitant about including women.

"On the one hand, she may become an element of psychological imbalance on the male crew. On the other hand, women respond to emergencies better," Gorshkov told ITAR-Tass.

More News in this Category