Russia to help India build manned spaceship

Moscow, Dec 23 (PTI) Russia will help India build a
domestic manned spaceship by 2020 sharing the technology used
in developing Souyz spacecraft, a senior official said
Wednesday.

"The Indian side intends to use the experience of
building the manned spaceship Soyuz to advance in building
their own spaceship. We will build this spaceship on a similar
technical scheme, but it will not resemble Soyuz," he said.
Chief of the department of piloted programmes of the
federal space agency (Roskosmos) Alexei Krasnov told Itar-Tass
news agency that the Soyuz is heavier and cannot be launched
by a light Indian booster.
"These plans are outlined until 2020," he said.
President and Designer General of the Russian Aerospace
Corporation Energia Vitaly Lopota said the corporation's
specialists "possess all space technologies," which they can
share with Indian partners.
"With Roskosmos's appropriate support we will be able to
reequip technically and increase the production of the
spaceships Soyuz," he noted.
New spaceships Soyuz can also be used for the
spaceflights of first Indian astronauts. This issue has
already been discussed with India, Krasnov said.
"A flight of Indian astronauts aboard the Soyuz
without a mission to the ISS was among the issues, which we
discussed with Indian partners," he noted. PTI SDG
ANU


The information contained in this electronic message and any attachments to this
message are intended for the exclusive
use of the addressee(s) and may contain proprietary, confidential or privileged
information. If you are not the intended
recipient, you should not disseminate, distribute or copy this e-mail. Please
notify the sender immediately and destroy
all copies of this message and any attachments contained in it.