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NASA has rejected a suggestion by the Russian Space Agency to extend the duration of manned missions to the International Space Station (ISS) from six months to a year, a spokeswoman told AFP Tuesday. "Last week NASA sent a letter to its Russian partners saying that we need additional time to study the proposal," Debra Rahn, a NASA spokeswoman, said in Moscow. "The time is not appropriate in part because the station is currently in a reduced operational state and... we don't have sufficient countermeasures in place yet to offset the effects that a longer-duration space flight would have on the crew," she said. At the end of March, Russia told NASA that it favors extending the missions at the ISS to one year partly to help supplement its cash-strapped coffers. Since the United States froze all space shuttle flights following the Columbia accident in February 2003 which claimed the lives of seven astronauts, the ISS has been relying solely on Russian Soyuz spaceships for supplying it with men and freight, thus increasing the financial strain on Russia. While the cash-strapped Russian Space Agency normally supplements its income by flying European astronauts and space tourists to the ISS, it now has much fewer opportunities to take them on board its Soyuz vessels. "The possibilities for the Russian Space Agency to earn extra money have gone down considerably," as Russian spacecraft now have to send to the ISS Russian and US crews that used to fly on US shuttles, Sergei Gorbunov, the spokesman for the Russian Space Agency, was quoted as saying in late March. Extending manned missions to the ISS by six months following Russia's suggestion would have made one seat available for a European astronaut or a space tourist on every other Soyuz flight. Sending a space tourist to the ISS for 10 days earns the Russian Space Agency 20 million dollars (16.5 million euros), while it charges between 14.5 and 18 million dollars (12 and 15 million euros) to fly a European astronaut there for the same duration. NASA last month postponed to March 2005 at the earliest the resumption of space shuttle launches to make further modifications to the program. All rights reserved. � 2004 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse. Quick Links   Nov 02, 2006 |
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