Russia Begins Work On a Lunar Lander (examiner.com)

MarkWhittington writes: Whether and when Russia will try to send cosmonauts to the moon is an open question. The Putin government has heavily slashed spending on the Russian space program, a measure brought on by declining oil and gas revenues. But, as Popular Mechanics reports, Russian engineers have gone ahead and have started to design a lunar lander for the eventual Russian lunar surface effort. When money is going to be forthcoming for such a vehicle is unknown, though Russia could partner with another country with lunar ambitions, such as China or the European Union.

Comments

well

[N3wsByt3]

I, for one, hail our Russian Mooning Overlords!

Another benefit of low crude pricing

[rmdingler]

It's important to Russia to matter. Putin's goal is to continue to advance the self worth of a nation on its heels from the dissolution of a superpower.

This is good, because it opens up opportunities for cooperation with the proud Russian people that might not have existed at 80 Euro oil.

The sooner we cease petty tribal conflicts here on earth, the sooner we can get on with hating life forms on other worlds.

Re:Another benefit of low crude pricing

[bobbied]

The sooner we cease petty tribal conflicts here on earth, the sooner we can get on with hating life forms on other worlds.

There are no life forms from other worlds that we will ever have to directly deal with. We know there is nothing within our solar system that is any danger to us. Interstellar space is too large and too hostile to life to make transport possible for any kind of life to get here or for us to get there, ever. So, your wish will never come to be.... Maybe we can stop hating, but I seriously doubt we are up to that.

Re:Another benefit of low crude pricing

[Khomar]

The level of arrogance and ignorance in both your post and the grandparent would be astounding if it wasn't for the fact that it appears to be all-too-common. That "landlocked Asian minor country" has the largest coastline of any nation in the world. They are in the midst of rapid deployment of technologies to exploit the resources and opportunities of the arctic region including many new icebreakers in an effort to open a northern sea route (which may become very viable if the global warming predictions come true). Further, their current military campaign in Syria has proven remarkably effective, especially in contrast to the anemic actions of the United States and our western allies before they entered the conflict. They have demonstrated the capabilities of submarines being able to fire missiles while submerged to the effective use of some of their most modern fighters (as opposed to our failed F-35) and effective long range cruise missiles. They are growing increasingly capable while we appear to be stagnating.

It should also be noted that Russia has been signing major deals with some of the world's largest nations at the same time that we seem to be alienating our friends here in the United States. Far from being a needy border-line-third-world-nation, Russia seems to be showing us up time and again. Twice now the United States in the past few years, the United States has been forced to back down when Russia asserted their will in Syria, and despite economic pressure on Russia over Ukraine, they have not backed down at all. A lot of talk has been made over how Russia has a shrinking cash reserve and yet everyone seems to forget that _they_actually_have_a_reserve. Further, their foreign debt is currently decreasing at the same time our national debt has just reached $19 trillion. When one considers that our proposed defense budget is as large at the combined total of the next 8 countries and yet we have a fighter that cannot fight and a high-tech destroyer that cannot float, I don't think we have much room at all to speak of Russian corruption (though it almost certainly exists).

Given current trajectories, it seems to me that our country is more likely to face a future of irrelevancy than the Russians right now. Our press is very selective about what they cover, but reality has a nasty way of asserting itself and often in very painful ways.

Re:Obama's space policy

[SpaceDave]

Obama's policy may be uninspiring but that's still an improvement over Bush's plan which was untenable.

A better option would be to have an inspiring goal (eg return to the Moon or go to Mars) but with a public-private funding model. The age of large-scale government-only space projects such as the Bush proposal are no longer feasible. Meanwhile we have a burgeoning private space industry that can make significant, cost-effective contributions.

America, otoh, has 4 companies working

[WindBourne]

On it. And while Russia uses disposable, America's will be reusable. Sadly mark Whittington is all about BS and never about facts.

/. Poll opportunity

[Michael Woodhams]

Poll 1: Which nation/organization do you think will be next to land people on the moon?
* China (CNSA)
* USA (NASA)
* Japan (JAXA)
* Europe (ESA)
* India (ISRO)
* Russia (RFSA)
* North Korea (KCST)
* Privately funded (e.g. SpaceX, Blue Origin or Cowboy Neal without direct state support) (ETLA)

Poll 2: Which nation/organization do you want be next to land people on the moon?
(same options)

Re: Obama's space policy

[KeensMustard]

The other option is to not send redundant bags of meat into space. These days it makes just as much sense to send a pineapple or a meerkat as it does to send humans: none of the features of a human are particularly useful in the vacuum of space or near vacuum on Mars. Better to send a robot or bunch of robots specifically designed to achieve whatever the particular aims we have for that mission.

Lander is all they need. They have the other parts

[Robotbeat]

Honestly, Russia is in the enviable position of already having the critical parts needed for a crewed lunar mission.

They have Soyuz for crewed launches, Proton for heavy uncrewed, plus Angara coming on line to replace the troublesome Proton. Soyuz was originally designed for lunar missions, and could be fairly simply modified for lunar return. Russia also regularly does propellant transfer and autonomous docking and have a large array of storable-propellant upper stages to use, so they could launch the lander partially filled using Proton into a distant lunar orbit and refuel and/or reposition using a Progress vehicle (perhaps tweaked to allow bigger propellant tanks).

Soyuz could dock with a couple of full Briz-M stages in LEO, push out a lunar orbit and meet with the pre-place lander. ...I suspect Russia will not build a mega-rocket like SLS. They don't need to, since they're very good at docking and propellant transfer (something they do regularly on ISS). Which is good because they don't exactly have a lot of money right now.

Re: Obama's space policy

[taylorius]

Humans aren't particularly well suited to the summit of Mount Everest either. Instead of trying to climb it, we should just send an ice climbing robot to reach the summit. It can chemically analyse the ice, and tell us how cold it is - mission accomplished!