Russia ’ s Threat to Quit the Space Station Looks Hollow

You can tell you’ve left the American segment of the International Space Station (ISS) and entered the Russian segment when the walls go from white to salmon-colored. It’s a singularly unlovely salmon, and if Russian designers had to do it over again perhaps they’d have picked up a different can of paint. Either way, the color had a meaning: the U.S. and Russia—old Cold War rivals—might be cooperating in space, but this part of the giant station was still Russian soil. This week, that fact took on more than just symbolic meaning, when Yuri Borisov, the newly appointed head of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, emerged from a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin with word that the 24-year partnership Moscow and Washington have maintained, building and operating the ISS, was coming to an end. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “The decision to leave the station after 2024 has been made,” Borisov said. “I think that by that time we will start forming a Russian orbiting station.” The announcement was both a surprise and not a surprise. The aging ISS has long been scheduled to be decommissioned and deorbited by 2024. But lately, NASA and President Joe Biden have been working on plans to extend the station’s operation until 2030. The 15 partner nations that control the ISS—which, in addition to the U.S. and Russia, include Canada, Japan, and eleven countries that are part of the European Space Ag...
Source: TIME: Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Uncategorized healthscienceclimate Space Source Type: news