Russia To Build an Orbital Construction Plant

jamax writes "Russia plans to build an orbital plant for the production of spacecraft (link to sketchy Google translation of the Russian original) that are too big to build planetside, or are just too bulky to fire into orbit once built. Presumably these are the ships we would fly to the Moon and Mars. Plans seem to be rather sparse at the moment, with the tentative construction date set for 2020, after the ISS is scheduled for decommissioning."

on-orbit assembly, finally

[QuantumG]

I hope that the Russians are *not* looking at flying to the Moon or Mars. The NEAs make much more interesting destinations where their expertise in micro-gravity environments can be best put to use.

Re:Impressive...If It Works

[interstellar_donkey]

At the very least, it might start up a new space race, which would be a much needed motivation to get the US to start seriously looking at space travel again.

those Russians

[Anonymous Coward]

A big spacecraft build in orbit because it is impossible to launch as a whole? This is nothing more than a plan for the follow-up for the ISS.

The only new thing about it is the idea that a (set of) module(s) could detach and make a trip to another planet.

Wouldn't put too much faith in this

[alex.vingardt]

1) I wouldn't put too much faith into what this website (ie. lenta.ru) posts (they are known to post rumors as actual news) 2) The average age of members of the Russian Academy of Sciences is over 70 (which is a miracle in itself since the life expectancy for males is 59). People who could've been developing space projects like this have been choosing to work for private companies for the last 20 years or so. Space programs have always been monopolized by the government and these jobs don't pay well enough to attract recent graduates. Whatever projects the Russian Space agency claims to have in the pipeline (if indeed they do) will never be realized b/c of lack of qualified professionals in the field (those 70-year olds working for the government right now are not gonna be there forever [unfortunately]). Whatever press releases they put out there are just merely for show so that NASA and the rest of the world will think that the Russian Space Program is not stagnant. Unfortunately, claiming that something revolutionary (and not so revolutionary) is being actively worked on when in fact it's not the case has become a trend in Russia.

Re:SEI/Space Station Freedom anyone?

[QuantumG]

The Russian space program typically does things for millions that would cost the US billions.. that's the way they do business.

Canadians will pwn them.

[billy901]

I doubt any of this will be possible without Canadian engineering. McDonald, Detweiller and associates created the Canadarm and Dexter, and Russia will probably require technology like this to make this possible. Canada is becoming a great hand in the space industry. McDonald, Detweiller and associates are really putting Canada in the news around the world. It's an excellent thing that they weren't sold.

Re:Not sure this will work

[FleaPlus]

Building anything in space is horrendously complex and expensive.

I think Bigelow Aerospace would disagree. They already have prototype space station modules in orbit, and in the next few years they'll be launching up more of them and linking them together into larger stations. Robert Bigelow seems to think he can make a profit on it, and is betting a few hundred million of his own dollars on it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigelow_Aerospace [wikipedia.org]

Re:Ret-con

[Protonk]

Because gene Roddenberry was a communist?

Or more likely, because he felt that it was a city the represented a look ahead and was cosmopolitan enough to get a feel for what Roddenberry felt the future should look like?

Actually, America MIGHT be interested

[WindBourne]

We have talked about building power plants in space. If it is cheaper to bring up the raw material and process it, then I suspect that we MIGHT do it. Of course, that remains to be seen.

Re:Impressive...If It Works

[tekiegreg]

Well yeah but...commercial space travel to the moon or Mars? We just barely got those commercial rockets into suborbital space...4 more years and they might finally hit orbital travel...

I'm not saying that commercial travel isn't feasible for the U.S., but just not in a 4 year timeframe that you think...

Re:One small step...

[DavidShor]

Really? I'm more worried about China's long term growth prospects then Russia's. Russia is an industrialized first world country. They are economically dependent on high oil prices, but I don't think oil prices will drop below $70 a barrel in the next 20 years.

China on the other hand, is an ethnic powderkeg(Tibet is just the tip of the iceberg) only kept together by guns and economic growth. From an economic standpoint, they have to deal with long-term environmental damage on a never before seen scale, a rapidly aging economy(unexpected side-effect of the one child policy), and very high rates of inflation.

If I had to pick, I'd say that Russa seems like the better bet.