KENNEDY SPACE CENTER (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 06th October, 2022) ENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Florida, October 6 (Sputnik) - The United States and Russia are backing each other on space matters including human flights and not only through integrated flights which in turn will allow the system to be more reliable, Human Space Flight Programs Executive Director Sergei KENNEDY SPACE CENTER (Pakistan Point news / Sputnik - 06th October, 2022) rikalev told reporters.
Krikalev said integrated flights are another stage in US-Russia space cooperation. A proposal for such integrated flights was made by the American side, and Russia supported it, he added.
"Because it made technical sense to make these wonderful flights, because it really increases the reliability of the system, it increases resistance," he said. "If there is any problem with a launch of the ship, with the insurance of the ship, our partner's segment will not be left without a specialist in this segment."
Krikalev went on to note that this is not the only area where Russia and the United States work in this way.
"In the American control center there are our specialists, in our control center, there are American specialists. And this group is just designed to support their Mission Control Center (MCC). If you remember many years ago, just when I was flying at Expedition 11, Houston was hit by Hurricane Katrina, and the entire staff of the MCC was evacuated, and the support group of American specialists that was in the Moscow MCC took over the duties of managing the American segment," he said.
That is, he, added, they secured themselves both at the level of ground services, and at the level of specialists who are engaged in training and at the level of astronauts.
"Now we are also making such cross connections that allow us to increase the stability of the system," he said.
Earlier on the day, The SpaceX Crew-5 mission spacecraft carrying two NASA astronauts, one Japanese astronaut, and a Russian cosmonaut, successfully blasted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
In July, Roscosmos and NASA signed an agreement on integrated flights of cosmonauts and astronauts to the ISS.
