posted 03-21-2022 06:00 PM               

Personally I thought that Musk would let OneWeb stay in a holding pattern until an ISRO, Arienespace (or Japanese) rocket could do the job, burning through its cash on the way to potential bankruptcy.

posted 04-02-2022 03:25 PM               

Dmitry Rogozin today (April 2) posted a thread on Twitter wherein he shared the replies he received from NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency to his request (demand) to have sanctions lifted. Suffice to say, the sanctions remain in place.

This, said Rogozin, is unacceptable and then wrote:

I believe that the restoration of normal relations between partners in the International Space Station and other joint projects is possible only with the complete and unconditional lifting of illegal sanctions.

Specific proposals of Roscosmos on the timing of the completion of cooperation within the ISS with the space agencies of the United States, Canada, the European Union and Japan will be reported to the leadership of our country in the near future.

posted 04-04-2022 03:33 PM               

Russia would also need to launch additional Progress vehicles to generate power for the Russian segment as the panels on Zvezda are degraded and no longer produce sufficient electricity.

posted 04-12-2022 07:51 AM               

"We will work as normal at least until 2024 on all our plans. They have not changed. Seat swap flights add confidence to the station’s safety: we understand the technology of running a US spaceship and the Americans know the technology of running our spacecraft," the Roscosmos chief said in an interview with the Rossiyskaya Gazeta daily.

This area of cooperation is useful, the Roscosmos chief emphasized.

"Why give up something that is useful? Anna Kikina [Russian woman cosmonaut] flew to Houston (USA) to familiarize herself with the design of the modules of the ISS American segment and the Crew Dragon spacecraft whose crew she may join. On our part, we are not ruining anything and keep to preliminary accords, although we continue waiting for the government’s decision on the program of cross flights," Rogozin explained.

posted 04-13-2022 10:42 AM               

Redirecting ESA programmes in response to geopolitical crisis

Following the Russian aggression against Ukraine, ESA's Director General has initiated a comprehensive review of all activities currently undertaken in cooperation with Russia and Ukraine. The objective is to determine the possible consequences of this new geopolitical context for ESA programmes and activities and to create a more resilient and robust space infrastructure for Europe.

The ESA Council on 13 April acknowledged the following findings and took the following decisions.

ESA will discontinue cooperative activities with Russia on Luna-25, -26 and -27. As with ExoMars, the Russian aggression against Ukraine and the resulting sanctions put in place represent a fundamental change of circumstances and make it impossible for ESA to implement the planned lunar cooperation. However, ESA's science and technology for these missions remains of vital importance. A second flight opportunity has already been secured on board a NASA-led Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) mission for the PROSPECT lunar drill and volatile analysis package (originally planned for Luna-27). An alternative flight opportunity to test the ESA navigation camera known as PILOT-D (originally planned for Luna-25) is already being procured from a commercial service provider.

Meanwhile, a way forward for the PILOT precision landing and hazard avoidance technology is already being defined. This capability is needed for European Lunar exploration activities such as the European Large Logistic Lander (EL3), proposed for decision at CM22. Further, the ESA Director General and the President of the Japanese agency JAXA last week signed an agreement to fly ESA's EMS-L, the Exospheric Mass Spectrometer instrument, on board the JAXA/ISRO LUPEX lunar rover mission. This adds to the growing list of European experiments flying to the Moon in the next few years.

Although all the elements of the ExoMars Rover mission (the launcher, carrier module, descent module and Rosalind Franklin rover) have now passed their flight readiness reviews, because cooperation with Roscosmos on ExoMars has been suspended, the mission will not be launched in September this year. Instead, a fast-track study is now under way led by Thales Alenia Space of Italy to assess options for the way forward.

posted 04-28-2022 02:28 PM               

The city of Ternopil, in western Ukraine, has renamed a street dedicated to the Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space.

posted 04-30-2022 10:33 AM               

The head of Russia's space program said Moscow will pull out of the International Space Station, state media reported, a move it has blamed on sanctions imposed over the invasion of Ukraine.

"The decision has been taken already, we're not obliged to talk about it publicly," Tass and RIA Novosti reported Roscosmos General Director Dmitry Rogozin as saying in an interview with state TV on Saturday. "I can say this only -- in accordance with our obligations, we'll inform our partners about the end of our work on the ISS with a year's notice."

posted 04-30-2022 11:13 AM               

"We should not hustle now declaring our stance and will carry on with our work within the timeframe set by the government, which is until 2024," Rogozin said. "A decision regarding the ISS future will depend to a great extent on the developing situation both in Russia and around it."

He also said that if Russia decided to withdraw from the ISS project, it would notify its foreign partners about this decision a year in advance.

Rogozin reiterated that a package of proposals on Russia's cooperation with foreign partners on the ISS project after the year of 2024 was sent to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the country's government.

"Our proposed decision, which was sent to the country's authorities, was considered at the Supervisory Board of the Roscosmos state corporation," he said.

posted 04-30-2022 01:22 PM               

While I hope the ISS continues to function, if it does get canned, one would hope that the NASA money being used to fund the program would (in the next budget cycle) get pumped into some other program(s), in particular commercial space stations.

posted 05-01-2022 09:42 AM               

The missing capability is stablization, which the Zvezda service module provides using three control moment gyros.

posted 05-01-2022 08:55 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
Reboost capability is not really the pressing concern: In addition to Starliner, as mentioned, Cygnus also has the ability to reboost the space station.

---

How many launch vehicles remain for Cygnus, given that it relies on Russian hardware to launch?

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
The missing capability is stablization, which the Zvezda service module provides using three control moment gyros.

---

The technology to build a stabilization system, either a module or components that mount to the existing structure and have a smaller form, which increased how they can be launched to orbit, exists.

If the remaining technical partners step up and provide the capability needed to continue ISS operations, it would prove that the program truly is an international cooperation that expanded the capability of all partners.

If we imagine that Russia takes things further, and wants to remove their segments for use elsewhere (I am not saying they are), this would be another great engineering challenge that the remaining partners could tackle using the existing capabilities, and without the shuttle.

It would be sad to see the entire space station fail because one of the partners pulled out. This would be a unique opportunity to task the aerospace industry, as it stands today, with overcoming this engineering challenge and proving that the international partners and the commercial partners which stemmed from the ISS can continue the program.

Failing to do something to demonstrate that the system works without the Russians risks history reading that the program failed without the Russians.

Russia says that they will provide a year's notice for terminating their participation. I do not know what efforts they are contractually tied to do during that year, but what if they did nothing? No boost, no maintenance, no defect rectification? Just use that year to bring the crew home and nothing else. Could Russia bring it all to an end, or could the remaining partners continue on regardless? I find it an interesting question.

posted 05-01-2022 09:41 PM               

What Russia is considering now is what it was considering prior to its invasion of Ukraine — whether to continue the use of the space station beyond 2024. Recall, under the previous administration, the U.S. was ready to walk away from the space station in 2025. Now, the U.S. wants to extend to 2030 and the partners are weighing if they want to do so as well.

posted 05-02-2022 04:01 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by oly:
If we imagine that Russia takes things further, and wants to remove their segments for use elsewhere...

---

If the answer to that is that Russia simply removes its cosmonauts, gives due notice, then "switches off" its modules, what then?

posted 05-07-2022 07:40 PM               

Benjamin Rich, known for his travel channel Bald and Bankrupt, was held near a launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos said.

Dmitry Rogozin said Mr Rich was being investigated over "illegal acts".

The UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said it was investigating the reports.

A woman named Alina Tseliupa and reported to be from Belarus was also apprehended, said Mr Rogozin.

posted 05-09-2022 12:29 PM               

Lawmakers in the southern city of Ceske Budejovice approved a move to rescind the honorary citizenship of Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman cosmonaut, who is currently a member of the Russian parliament's lower chamber.

In explaining the move, municipal lawmakers said that Tereshkova's support of Russia's war against Ukraine and her role in changes to the Russian Constitution in 2020 that set up a framework allowing for President Vladimir Putin to run again in the next election made her unworthy of the honor.

posted 05-15-2022 06:12 AM               

Russia was making literally billions of dollars by selling NASA seats on Soyuz rockets. I wondered where all that money was going. It was obvious that Roscosmos wasn’t providing its employees with a safe work environment, adequate housing or what western countries would consider a living wage. Building at both locations looked to be in danger of collapse.

posted 05-15-2022 07:43 AM               

The Soyuz and Progress spacecraft belong to RSC Energia; the Soyuz rocket is the product of the Progress Rocket Space Centre; training is overseen by Roscosmos' Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center; the Sokol spacesuits are produced by NPP Zvezda — and that is just a high level list of some of the companies and organizations involved. Suffice to say, the $56.3 million per seat was far from pure profit for Russia's federal space corporation.

posted 05-15-2022 09:32 AM               

Monopoly has its advantages. In 2006, the price tag for the one seat NASA purchased on the Soyuz was $22 million. Four years later, the Russians increased the cost to $25 million. It went up again - to $28 million - in the first half of 2011.

"During the second half of 2011, the price per seat jumped to $43 million. The price has continued to increase. For example, the price of purchased seats for launches in 2014 and 2015 are $55.6 million and $60 million, respectively,” the audit report noted.

In April, NASA signed another deal with Russia valued at $424 million for six additional seats to carry NASA astronauts to the Station during 2016 through June 2017, and the price per seat has increased to $71 million” – more than triple what the Russians charged in 2006.

This contract modification is $90,252,905.69 for the single crew mission seat in the fall of 2020, including all necessary training and preparation for launch, flight operations, landing and crew rescue for a long-duration mission as well as some limited crew cargo delivery to and from the station.

posted 05-15-2022 10:40 AM               

At the start, when the price was in the $22 to $28 million range, NASA was additionally paying Russia for Progress cargo flights, training, crew logistics and more. Over time, NASA folded those other expenses into a few and then a single contract covering all crew-related activities.

This is often overlooked when reporting on per seat costs.

Nor was the pricing unique to NASA. The same increase happened for all Soyuz customers, whether they were international partners or commercial space flight participants. Dennis Tito paid significantly less to fly to the space station than did Charles Simonyi.

posted 07-04-2022 05:47 AM               

The Russian cosmonauts who were lauded at the outset of the war on Ukraine in February for appearing to show their support for their invaded neighbours with yellow and blue spacesuits have been pictured on the International Space Station (ISS) holding the flags of the self-proclaimed republics in Luhansk and Donetsk, alongside a message celebrating what the Russian space agency Roscosmos termed the "liberation" of Luhansk.

In a message posted to the official Roscosmos Telegram channel, Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveyev and Sergey Korsakov are shown holding the flags of the two occupied territories, whose occupiers are recognised as legitimate authorities only by Russia and Syria among UN member states.

The message accompanying the pictures says: "Liberation Day of the Luhansk People's Republic! We celebrate both on Earth and in space."

posted 07-07-2022 06:17 PM               

NASA strongly rebukes Russia using the International Space Station for political purposes to support its war against Ukraine, which is fundamentally inconsistent with the station's primary function among the 15 international participating countries to advance science and develop technology for peaceful purposes.

posted 07-08-2022 08:21 AM               

It is unacceptable that the ISS becomes a platform to play out the political or humanitarian crises happening on the ground. The purpose of the ISS is to conduct research and prepare us for deeper exploration. It must remain a symbol of peace and inspiration.

We will do in the Russian segment everything what we consider necessary and useful. And I advise Western partners to cancel their stupid sanctions.