Russian energy suggests that the ISS is close to ruin, the nation should build its own space station instead

A recent report by Russian manufacturer RSC Energia, the main developer and contractor of the Russian manned spaceflight program, says that a number of elements aboard the International Space Station are on the verge of catastrophic failure. The damage has become so severe that it will become too expensive to repair and as such Russia should focus instead on completing its own orbital station, says the flight director of the Russian ISS segment Vladimir Alekseevich Soloviev.

“Until 2025, Russia has an obligation to participate in the International Space Station program. There are already a number of items that are badly damaged and are going out of order. Many of them are not replaceable. After 2025, we anticipate an avalanche failure of numerous elements aboard the ISS, ”said Soloviev, who is also the first deputy general designer for flight operations at Energia.

The comments were made by Soloviev during a space council meeting of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which took place on November 25, 2020 and were reported by Scientific Russia on their website.

Participants included the president of the Russian Academy of Sciences and chairman of the meeting, Alexander Mikhailovich Sergeev, former director of the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IKI RAS), Lev Matveyevich Zeleny, vice president of the Academy Russian science center Yuri Balega and the director of the Russian science center for missiles and spacecraft, TsNIIMASH, Alexander Milkovskii.

During the discussion, the Flight Director also noted that the estimates for solving the problems aboard the ISS would amount to about 10-15 billion rubles, a cost considered “too high” by RSC Energia.

Instead, Soloviev said, it is necessary to “review the terms of further participation in the program” and focus on the implementation of the Russian Orbital Service Station (ROSS), currently under development at RSC Energia.

ROSS should consist of three to seven modules that can be performed automatically or with a crew of two to four people. ROSS is expected to be implemented after 2024, but exact dates have not been mentioned.

The overwhelming comments made by Soloviev were quickly spread by the Russian media as an indirect suggestion from the flight director that RSC Energia wanted to stop countries’ participation in the International Space Station program.

This was later waived by the Roscosmos press service which was forced to release an official denial of the information within hours of the news hitting the main Russian media.

The quote from the first deputy general designer for flight operations of RSC Energia Vladimir Solovyov, “contradicts the reality,” said the official refutation of Roscosmos, adding that his comments were “informative in nature and did not contain proposals to stop participation to the ISS “.

The rebuttal went on to state that the operational duration of the ISS “depends on the technical and political issues discussed with the partners”. In any case, Roscosmos said, the agency plans to start consultations with NASA and other partners on these matters early next year.

Interestingly, Roscosmos’s rebuttal did not negate Solovyov’s comments on the ISS’s apparent ruinous state.

The press service of the space agency, on the other hand, reiterated that Roscosmos is awaiting proposals and a technical note from RSC Energia on the new multifunctional orbital station. After review by the Roscosmos Scientific and Technical Council, the project will then be discussed with the government, the rebuttal says.

The ISS was plagued with a continuous air leak this year and had to travel three times in 2020 alone to avoid debris. However, last year NASA said it was considering allowing two short-duration private astronaut missions per year to the space station to revive the economy; a proposal that presumably would be impossible if the ISS were indeed in a seemingly dilapidated state.