New resupply ship may perform maiden flight after 2020
MOSCOW. Nov 28 (Interfax-AVN) - Russia's new resupply ship with an increased lift capacity may perform its maiden flight after 2020, Energia Corporation said.
"The resupply ship with an increased lift capacity, which will give transportation and engineering support to the International Space Station (ISS), may take off for the first time after 2020," the corporation said in a report seen by Interfax on Monday.
The conceptual design of the spaceship will be ready in December 2016, the corporation said, noting that the spaceship would not be a re-entry vehicle.
Spaceships of the kind will be launched from Baikonur, using the infrastructures built for Soyuz MS and Progress MS spacecraft. Once the test flights are done, the new spaceship will fully replace the present-day Progress MS, it said.
"The new spaceship will make it possible to deliver more cargo per mission. Hence, the economic effect of resupply ship launches to the ISS and its prospective replacement will grow. This is very important for us," Energia Corporation General Director Vladimir Solntsev said.
The new spaceship will reduce the cost of delivering one kilogram of cargo by 15% compared to the Progress MS. The new spaceship will be able to bring 3,400 kilograms of payload (fuel, compressed gas, water and dry cargo) per flight, while Progress can take aboard no more than 2,600 kilograms of weight. The new resupply ship will accommodate its payload in a larger cargo bay with a central passage and standard shelves, which will simplify loading and unloading operations and will allow for its use as an ISS warehouse.
Larger amounts of delivered fuel and a cruise engine with higher thrust will increase the efficiency of the spaceship's use to adjust the ISS orbit and will make it possible to remove the station from orbit after its life ends.
The creation of a resupply ship with an increased lift capacity became topical after the appearance of the modernized Soyuz-2.1b rocket with broader capacities and a larger nose cone on the market. The duration of the design stage has been significantly reduced by using onboard systems and engineering solutions from the Progress MS resupply ship and the Progress M-UM module spaceship. The conceptual design is being financed from the budget.