Russia announces leaving the International Space Station (ISS) after 2024, NASA not aware
Steph Deschamps / July 27, 2022
Russia will stop operating the International Space Station (ISS) after 2024, announced Tuesday the head of the Russian Space Agency, Yuri Borissov. We will undoubtedly fulfill all our obligations to our partners, but the decision to leave this station after 2024 has been taken of the ISS, said Yuri Borissov, during a televised meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
I think that by then we will start to create the Russian Orbital Space Station. The Russian Orbital Space Station (ROSS) will be the main priority of the national space program. The future of Russian manned spaceflight must be based above all on a systemic and balanced scientific program so that each flight enriches our knowledge in the space field, he said.
For its part, NASA says it has not been officially informed: We have not received any official statement from our partner regarding today's news, said Robyn Gatens, the director of the ISS at NASA, Tuesday morning at a space conference in Washington.
Appointed head of Roscosmos, the Russian Space Agency, in mid-July, Yuri Borissov replaced Dmitri Rogozin, known for his abrasive style and outrageous nationalism. Until this appointment, Yuri Borissov, 65, had the portfolio of Deputy Prime Minister in charge of the Russian military-industrial complex, which also includes the space domain. The space sector is in a difficult situation, and I think that my main task (...) is not to lower the bar, but to raise it, providing above all the space services necessary for the Russian economy, he said, citing navigation, communication and data transmission.
By 2020, Russia had lost its monopoly on sending people into space (with its aging but reliable Soyuz launchers and spacecraft) with the arrival on the scene of billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX. The Russian-Western cooperation in the space field has also been plunged by the offensive launched by Russia since February 24 against its Ukrainian neighbor. Western sanctions against Russia because of this offensive partly affect the Russian aerospace industry and may have an effect on the ISS, where some refuelling could be disrupted. Finally, the Russian space sector has been plagued for years by corruption and lack of innovation.