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Roskosmos cannot take the Cossack out of Europe due to the lack of air traffic

In a conversation with RIA Novosti, the head of the press service of Roscosmos, Dmitry Strugovets, said that the space agency cannot withdraw the Kazachok landing platform, developed for the ExoMars mission jointly with ESA, from Europe. The ESA Council refused to cooperate with Roskosmos in mid-March of this year, instructing the agency's director general Josef Aschbacher to quickly find a replacement for the Cossack.

Roscosmos CEO Dmitry Rogozin, after breaking off relations with ESA, said that the agency is going to launch its Martian mission in the next few years. However, according to Strugovets, in any case, it will have to build a new landing platform. By the time of launch, the resource of ground storage of Kazachka's equipment will end.

“The manufacture of a new landing platform will be required due to the fact that by the next mission most of the units and instruments will have exhausted their ground storage resource,” Strugovets said.

On February 25, ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher announced the ongoing cooperation with Roscosmos on the ISS projects and the ExoMars joint mission. But already on February 28, Aschbacher called the launch of the mission in 2022 unlikely. On this day, negotiations were to be held with Roscosmos on further cooperation, but the European side refused them. On March 17, the ESA Council abandoned the ExoMars joint program with Russia, citing "the impossibility of continuing cooperation with Roscosmos."

Roskosmos cannot take the Cossack out of Europe due to the lack of air traffic