MOSCOW. March 25 (Interfax) - Russia is interested in building an international research base on the Moon, Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin told the press.
"Our main focus is not on the lunar orbit or the Deep Space Gateway project, instead we are focused on building an international research lunar base," Rogozin said.
Roscosmos and the Russian Academy of Sciences are considering the possibility of sending a manned mission to the Moon, Rogozin said. "All our engineering calculations are related to that. We are calculating the lifting capacity of the super-heavy rocket so that it could bring at least 27 tonnes of cargo to the lunar orbit and surface," he said.
Nevertheless, Russia will continue the dialogue with the United States on its participation in the lunar station's project. Besides, before building a habitable station on the Moon, Roscosmos plans to deploy a constellation of auxiliary satellites, including remote sensing vehicles, in the lunar orbit, Rogozin said.
"We are interested in having a docking module adapted to our spaceship in the lunar orbit. We will need to deploy several spacecraft in the lunar orbit for helping lunar sensing and navigation. We are actively interacting with the U.S. side and exchanging information in these areas," he said.
Rogozin noted that Russia could modernize the existent Soyuz manned spaceships for flying around the Moon. "We have a potential for strengthening Soyuz spaceships for flying around the Moon. In fact, a second hull could be welded. A two-launch system is possible: the spaceship may first dock with the ISS and depart for the Moon later. This can be done, according to calculations of our ballisticians," he said.
Rogozin added it would be premature to talk about any specific agreements on bilateral cooperation in the lunar station's project. "We have no written agreements with NASA. There have been consultations and plans to hold such talks during the visit to the United States, but it has been postponed. I met with NASA Associate Administrator William Gerstenmaier during a launch from Baikonur last week. We discussed those issues in detail. The agreements make one thing clear: NASA is tasked with accelerating the lunar program," Rogozin said.
He added that NASA was interested in Russia building an alternative system of transportation to the lunar orbit.
"We have informed NASA colleagues about the time our super heavy launch vehicle will be ready. It is important for them to have a second transportation system. For now, even the existence of the Orion ship does not fully guarantee the transportation system's reliability. We are synchronizing our plans with U.S. colleagues as much as possible," he said.
Meanwhile, Roscosmos expects to coordinate main parameters of the Russian lunar program as early as this year.
"Speaking of Russia, our program will be secured with the adoption of fundamentals of the state space policy in the middle of the year. The Security Council will have a meeting on space activity by the end of spring," Rogozin said.
It was reported in September 2017 that Roscosmos and NASA had agreed on building the Deep Space Gateway lunar orbital station. Its first module is due to be launched from the Earth in 2022, and the crew will be international.
The media said earlier that Russia was not happy with the role assigned to it in the project.