Russian part of the International Space Station (ISS) “It is in the past”The head of the flight program, former cosmonaut and builder of spacecraft, Vladimir Solovyov, said in an interview published today by the official Russian agency RIA Novosti.

“At the end of July, a meeting of the Presidium of the Scientific Technological Council Roscosmos (Russian Space Agency) was held, at which it was confirmed that the station is in its final stages.”said Solovyov, chief builder at Energuia, a maker of rockets and spacecraft.

According to the head of the segment’s flight program, none of the participants in the last construction board meeting gave guarantees that the orbital platform equipment would continue to function after 2025.

Added Solovov, who proposed the creation of a new Russian space in view of the erosion of the International Space Station station.

Last April, after an air leak was detected in the Russian part of the International Space Station, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov announced that the condition of the platform structures could cause a catastrophe.

Soloviov confirmed that 80% of the equipment of the Russian Zvezdá unit is already out of warranty.

“We have never hidden this information. It is all in our reporting. We warned years ago that it was time to think about a new space station‘, he confirmed.

For his part, Roscosmos spokesman Vladimir Ustimenko told TASS that in the period until 2025, “the situation regarding the security and operation of the plant has come under control.”

incident

On July 31, the Director General of the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), Dmitry Rogozin, reported that Pressure drop in the transport chamber of the Russian unit Zvezdá for the International Space Station (ISS).

I’ve just seen pressure reports: 14.07, 473 mm; 20.07, 273 mm; 25.07, 200 mm”, the head of Roscomos wrote on Twitter.

He added that the pressure in the transfer chamber had dropped to 160 mm the previous week, the day the Russian multipurpose scientific unit Naúka was attached to Zvezdá, a maneuver that caused a change in engine direction due to the spontaneous ignition of its thrusters. 45 degree ISS, which had to be corrected.

“This is an expected drop in pressure, not ‘surprising’ in the Zvezdá unit, which is still experiencing problems,” said Rogozin, who stressed that this situation “has nothing to do” with the Naúka coupling.

The first air leak in the Zvezdá unit, due to a 4-centimeter crack, was detected and closed in September 2020, but the pressure continued to drop, albeit to a lesser degree.

In March of this year, ISS crew members shut down two more slits in Zvezda, but tight tests of the unit found that it continued to lose pressure.

According to Roscosmos, these small air leaks pose no risk to the orbital platform crew as they can be compensated for by the resources on board.

The Russian Space Agency has determined that the Zvezdá module’s transfer room is isolated from the station’s “main volume”.

(With information from EFE)

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