2 Jun 2022 10:04

Roscosmos itself may switch on eROSITA telescope, turned off at Germany's request - Rogozin

MOSCOW. June 2 (Interfax) - Roscosmos may resume the operation of the Spektr-RG Russian-German space observatory's eROSITA telescope, which was switched off at Germany's request, Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin said.

"Despite Germany's demand to switch off one of the telescopes on board Spektr-RG, Russian specialists insist that its operation should continue. Roscosmos will make a decision on this score in the near future," Rogozin said on Telegram.

Rogozin said on February 26 that the German Aerospace Center had notified Russia of its intention to switch off its telescope on the Spektr-RG Russian-German space observatory.

The Spektr-RG spacecraft was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on July 13, 2019. It was built jointly with Germany as part of Russia's federal space program under a contract with the Russian Academy of Sciences. The observatory is equipped with two x-ray grazing incidence telescopes, i.e. ART-XC of the Russian Academy of Sciences Space Research Institute and eROSITA built by the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE, Germany). The telescopes are installed on the Navigator space platform (designed by Russia's Lavochkin Research and Production Association), adapted for the project's objectives.

The mission's main objective is to chart a map of the whole sky in soft and hard X-ray bands with unprecedented sensitivity.