Russia loses in the battle for space
The Russian Federation is getting closer to the moment when its space capabilities will be equal to the country of the second row. The last two decades, it was saved by the Soviet backlog - technology, technology, trained personnel, all the legacy of the fallen Red Empire.
In recent years, we have no in-orbit scientific apparatus, more and more satellites, or their components, are being created abroad. Yes, and the satellites produced are of low quality, of low duration of work, and more and more often unsuccessful launches occur.
Only in the last 2 of the month of the RF, the geodesic satellite “Geo-IK-3” was lost by the 1 satellite of the GLONASS system (the national global positioning system).
It was found by the Americans, the Command of the Aerospace Defense of North America (NORAD), discovered the device and reported to Roscosmos. The apparatus went out to the wrong orbit. The damage from only the last failures amounted to almost 6 billion rubles.
The main directions of the modern space industry, and the participation of the Russian Federation in them
Satellites
The electronic industry in the USSR also lagged behind the advanced developments of the West and Japan. The situation has now become even worse. The development of electronics ensures the life of the satellite, Western satellites "live" 7-12 for years, Russian for up to 5 for years.
National Global Positioning System
This system began to be created in Soviet times (the first satellite was launched in 1982 year), as an analogue of the GPS system of the United States. In the system, in order for it to work stably, there must be at least 24 satellites, by 1996, they were put into orbit, but by 2001, there were only 6. Due to the poor quality of electronics, they are very short-lived.
In 2001, a plan was adopted that the group was restored by 2009, but as usual in the Russian Federation, they did not have time. The problem is the same as in 80-90-e 20 century, the satellites quickly break. The Russian Federation is forced to launch new satellites almost every year in order to compensate for the retirement of old ones, producers will benefit, but the budget is a big minus.
Telecommunications
Russia buys ready-made telecommunications satellites, or collects from components of Western companies. Therefore, the service life is on average 8-12 years.
Italian, French, Belgian, Japanese, German, and Yusov companies took part in their creation.
Meteorology
In the 2004-2009 years of the Russian Federation, after the failure of the Meteor satellite, did not have a single meteorological satellite and bought meteorological data from the United States and Japan.
In 2000-2001 The Lavochkin Scientific Production Association began the development of the second-generation weather satellite Electro-L, and it was planned to launch it in the 2006 year. But, launched only in January 2011. Now the RF has only two weather satellites. By 2015, they plan to launch five more satellites, but plan this one and make another.
Mars explorations
The latest research of Mars was conducted by the Soviet Union in the 1988 year - the Phobos project. The Russian program Mars-96 failed, the new program Phobos-Grunt is constantly postponed - the launch of the station was planned in 2004, then 2006, deferred to 2009 for the year, then for November 2011, but would it fly?
Moon exploration
The program of research of the Moon was frozen in the USSR. At 2013, the Luna-Resource station is scheduled to land, the station is to put an Indian satellite into the Moon's orbit, and to land the moon rover on the Moon itself. In fact, this is a complete repetition of the program of the Soviet Union from 1966 of the year ("Luna-9").
Moon programs of other powers
USA
Since 2009, NASA's LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) satellite, which has already found water on the Earth's satellite, has been in orbit of the Moon, according to which a three-dimensional map of the Moon has been compiled. In 2011, 2 scientific apparatus will be launched to study the gravity of the moon. In 2013, they plan to launch a probe to study the atmosphere of the moon. At the end of 2013 - beginning of 2014. US plans to land on the moon robots, the humanoid robot Robonaut-2, has already been prepared and is being tested on the ISS. This will be the first step towards establishing a permanent base on the Moon.
China
Two Chinese satellites were working in the orbit of the moon. By 2020, China plans to land its astronauts on the moon.
India
2008-2009 The first Indian satellite worked in the orbit of the moon’s satellite. In the 2013 year, with the help of Russia, they plan to launch the 2 satellite and land the moon rover.
Japan
In 2010, an ambitious program was adopted: to land robots on the Moon before 2015, and to create a permanent automatic station. By 2025, they want to make it habitable.
European Union
The European Space Agency (ESA) plans in 2016-2018. land a research apparatus to study the surface and geology of the moon. Before 2020, the EU wants to create an automatic station.
Results
- In fact, all the leading countries-leaders of the planet lead the moon race, the undisputed leader of the race is the United States of America. The plans are very ambitious - in fact, soon the exploration of the moon will begin, first by robotics, then by humans. Russia, on the background of such plans, is a complete outsider.
- The Russian Federation is absent in such areas as automatic interplanetary scientific probes, orbital astronomy (there are no orbital telescopes of its own), there are no orbital scientific satellites, there are no our satellites in the orbit of Mars, Venus.
- The only industry where the Russian Federation still maintains a leading position is carrier rockets. But, this is also not for long, the US to 2013-2014. plan to create new launch vehicles.
In the conditions of depletion of the resources of the planet Earth, space expansion becomes the only possibility of human survival. And the Russian Federation, in order to preserve itself in the new world, it is necessary to create a plan for the grand mastery of the Near Space and the study of the Far, almost re-creating the space industry and science.
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