photo: rian.ru
Putin has announced he has plans to spend 52 billion dollars to revamp Russia's space program in the next 16 years.
The expenditure will be in part for a completely new launch facility.
Putin announced the program at Russia's new ground control room at the Vostochny cosmodrome, which is still under construction, as he spoke directly with Russian cosmonauts that are orbiting earth in the International Space Station.
The money will be spent in yearly installments of 7 billion, which as far as space expenditures go, is not a very large sum. NASA's budgets exceeds 14 billions in most years.
The reason for the construction of the new cosmodrome is to shift all launches away from the older one in Kazakhstan.
The new structure should afford the cosmonauts an easier landing. Currently, re-entry from the space station has become stuff of legend: the downward ride has been described by astronauts of all countries as a frightful experience, even for hardened veterans of space which ends in very jarring landing on hard soil.
Most re-entry of manned capsules or modules are made in the ocean for a softer landing. All of the US space missions of the 60s and 70s re-entered via an ocean landing.
The new cosmodrome will allow such landings for Russian spacecraft and modules too once it is completed, so that there will be no more hard landings.
Putin also said that the expenditure will bring Russia into the 21st century, as its space program and facilities have fallen behind in unmanned activities, because it had focused for so long on manned flights.
source: NPR 4.13.13
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