Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, has recently given signs that it may abandon its International Space Station partnership in 2024. Now, he has informed NASA that he plans to stay on the program until at least 2028, Reuters reports. If this news is true, we can say that Roscosmos wants to continue its ISS partnership until a new Russian space station, currently with a target date of 2028, is operational.
Roscosmos had given a statement to Russian President Vladimir Putin, under its newly appointed manager Yuri Broisov, to leave the ISS partnership after 2024. However, this explanation was not very clear. He did not specify when Roscosmos plans to leave the partnership after 2024, and simply says that Russia hopes to transition to focus on the newly developed Russia Orbital Service Station (ROSS). In addition, a NASA official stated that they had not heard any “official statement” from Roscosmos.
However, Roscosmos officials communicated with NASA on Tuesday that they planned to continue their partnership with the ISS, with the ROSS station replacing it in 2028, with at least some communication with NASA, Reuters reported. “We’re not getting any signs that anything is changing at the run level,” Kathy Lueders, NASA assistant director of space studies, told Reuters on Wednesday.
NASA and Roscosmos are the two largest partners on the International Space Station, and both agencies undertake executive duties for the space station so that it can have a continuous human presence while the ISS is in orbit. However, escalating tensions between the US and Russia after the invasion of Ukraine caused many to worry about the ISS partnership. While Dmitry Rogozin, who was in the executive chair of Roscosmos before Borisov, frequently threatened Roscosmos’ withdrawal from the ISS, NASA continued to say that work on the space station was proceeding normally.
But Rogozin was known for his strange and unlikely allegations and threats even before tensions escalated. As Borisov was a relative newcomer to Roscosmos, it was not known how serious his statements were.
In short, we don’t seem to need to worry about Russia leaving the ISS, at least until 2028. NASA plans to have the space station operational by 2030, and it appears Russia will remain on the space station for most of the remaining time.
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