Russia, China agree to build joint lunar space station

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The heads of the respective space agencies of the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding on behalf of their national governments.

“China and Russia will use their accumulated experience in the fields of space science, research and development as well as the use of space equipment and space technologies to jointly develop a roadmap for the construction of a station. International Lunar Scientific Research Institute (ILRS), “the Chinese space agency said.

A statement from the Russian space agency Roscosmos said the two organizations planned to “promote cooperation on the establishment of an ILRS open to all interested countries and international partners, with the aim of strengthening cooperation in this area. research and promote the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes for the benefit of all mankind. “

The lunar space station will be “a complex of experimental and research facilities” created on the surface of the moon and / or in lunar orbit, according to the Roscosmos statement. The facilities will be designed for a range of multidisciplinary research, including “test technologies with the possibility of long-term unmanned operation with the prospect of a human presence on the moon.”

China and Russia will now work on a roadmap for the design, development and operation of the station, and plan “for its presentation to the world space community,” Roscosmos said.

The two countries have also signed agreements to jointly establish a data center for the exploration of the moon and deep space. They plan to cooperate in the future on the Chinese Chang’e-7 and Russian Luna 27 missions, both of which aim to study the lunar south pole.

Only two countries have collected rocks from the moon. For China, this is just the beginning
Russia was a founding partner of the International Space Station (ISS), alongside the United States and other contributing countries and space agencies. The orbiting science lab celebrated its 20th anniversary of continuous human occupation in November of last year. To this day, the ISS remains humanity’s only operational and permanently manned space station. Unlike Russia, however, China is not involved in ISS initiatives, in part because of US federal law prohibiting cooperation with Beijing on space projects.
Russia traced its space program back to the Soviet Union, which in 1957 became the first country to launch a satellite – Sputnik 1 – out of Earth’s gravitational grip.

In the midst of a Cold War space race with the United States, the Soviets in 1960 sent the first living creatures into orbit and back again, including the space dogs, Belka and Strelka. Then, in 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin pushed the Americans into space.

In recent years, however, Russia has struggled to replicate the success of its first space program, experiencing a series of setbacks including probe launch failures amid funding cuts and suspected corruption.

China was late in the space race – it did not send its first satellite into orbit until 1970, when the United States had already landed an astronaut on the moon – but it was quickly caught up.

With billions of dollars in government investments, China has rapidly ramped up its space program over the past decade, putting space labs and satellites into orbit.

In 2019, China became the first country to send an unmanned rover across the moon. In July 2020, China launched its first unmanned mission to Mars – the Tianwen-1 probe, which entered Red Planet orbit in February this year. The next step will be to land a rover on the surface, which should happen in May or June.

And in December 2020, China’s Chang’e unmanned mission brought lunar samples back to Earth, making it the third country to successfully collect rocks from the moon.

Plans are also underway to send astronauts to the moon by the 2030s. If successful, China would only become the second country after the United States to put a citizen on the moon.

CNN’s Anna Chernova contributed to this report.

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