The Hindu : ISS: important role for Russia

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 12, 2003

International

International

ISS: important role for Russia

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW FEB. 11. With the U.S. space programme grounded, Russia has assumed main responsibility for keeping the International Space Station in orbit. The Russian unmanned cargo ship, Progress, on Tuesday fired its engines to lift ISS to a higher orbit, the job that was to be carried out by a U.S. shuttle next month.

Following the Columbia shuttle disaster on February 1, Russia has emerged as the sole nation among 15 partners in the ISS project capable of hauling supplies to the space station, correcting its orbit and evacuating space crews. Russian Soyuz-TMA crew capsules and Progress cargo ships are the only link to ISS and the three-man crew currently in space. In the past, U.S. shuttles used to ferry long-term crews to ISS, while Russian rockets were responsible for short missions to the station. Soyuz spaceships have also been used as emergency escape modules for the crew. Russian space officials said a Soyuz would carry a replacement crew to the station in late April, a month later than this should have been done by a U.S. shuttle.

Russia will have to double the number of spaceships it has been sending to the ISS to operate the station without shuttles. Space officials said Russia was ready to do the job, if the United States paid for the extra ships, as this would otherwise seriously strain the Russian space budget — only $265 million this year. Moreover, Russia would lose up to $40 millions this year because it has been forced to cancel plans to launch two tourists to the ISS, sources said. However, to invest in the production of Russian ships for the ISS, the U.S. Congress will have to waive or suspend the Iran Non-Proliferation Act of 1999, which barred NASA from procuring Russian-made space hardware on suspicion that it was supplying missile-related know-how to Iran.

The Russian manned space programme has had no fatalities since three cosmonauts died during re-entry in 1971; the two U.S. shuttle disasters killed 14 astronauts.

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