The European Space Agency decided to do without its cooperation with Russia

The ESA has "recognized the impossibility of continuing the ongoing cooperation with (the Russian space agency) Roscosmos for a launch of the ExoMars mission in 2022", announced the agency in a press release, at the end of its executive counsel.

The organization, which brings together 22 European states, also "deeply deplored the human losses and the tragic consequences of the aggression against Ukraine".

The ESA "fully aligns itself with the sanctions imposed on Russia by its member states".

Moreover, Roscosmos had taken the lead on February 26: when the European sanctions were announced, it had responded by suspending the activities of its Soyuz launcher from the European space port of Kourou, in French Guiana, and the recall of the hundreds of engineers and technicians who were installed there.

The head of the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), Dmitry Rogozin, said Thursday that he regretted the suspension of the ExoMars mission.

He called it a "very bittersweet event for all space enthusiasts" and "very regrettable".

Because if the launches of many ESA missions have so far relied on the use of the Russian Soyuz launcher from Kourou, others have been from the Baikonur site in Kazakhstan.

A prototype of the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin rover presented at the Airbus Defense and Space facility on February 7, 2019 in Stevenage, northern England BEN STANSALL AFP / Archives

It is from this last place that a Russian Proton rocket was to carry the ESA rover, Rosalind Franklin, next September before the Kazatchok lander, also Russian, deposits it on Martian soil.

Impossible "before 2026"

The mission, initially scheduled for 2020 and postponed due to the pandemic, is now seriously compromised, especially since the window of opportunity for the red planet only opens every two years.

The ESA council therefore authorized its director general, Josef Aschbacher, "to initiate an accelerated industrial study to better identify the possible options for advancing the ExoMars rover mission".

A Russian Proton-M rocket takes off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in July 2021, in Kazakhstan Handout Russian Space Agency Roscosmos/AFP/Archives

Mr. Aschbacher noted during a press briefing that a "launch this year is excluded" and impossible "at least before 2026".

He mentioned that "cooperation with NASA is also an option" to execute the mission.

All other ESA missions based on the use of the Soyuz launcher are also suspended, the ESA said in its press release.

These include two satellites for the European location constellation Galileo, the scientific mission of the Euclid space telescope, the European-Japanese Earth observation mission EarthCARE and a military satellite on behalf of the France.

For these missions, the head of ESA has "undertaken a review of alternative launch services", which "includes a review of the first Ariane 6 operational flights".

ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher in September 2021 in Berlin Paul Zinken AFP/Archives

The future European heavy launcher, which is to replace an Ariane 5 at the end of its life, is scheduled for an inaugural flight by the end of 2022. This first flight is planned without commercial load.

ISS stable and secure

The need for an alternative launcher to Soyuz portends delicate arbitrations for the granting of "places" on Ariane 6.

The French military observation satellite CSO-3, which was to be launched at the end of 2022 by a Soyuz rocket from Kourou, should finally be put into orbit by Ariane 6, about a year late, the French ministry said for example last Thursday. armies.

The important thing in this area "is to establish a rapid ramp-up" of the Ariane 6 launch rate, insisted Mr. Aschbacher.

The new launch site for the Ariane 6 rocket, in September 2021 in Kourou jody amiet AFP / Archives

The head of ESA has decided to hold "in the coming weeks" an extraordinary council of the agency to submit specific proposals to its member states to fulfill its missions.

They involve "undoing what we have built with Russia" since the launch of ever closer cooperation initiated by Western countries in the 1990s, after the end of the USSR.

The greatest symbol of this cooperation remains the International Space Station (ISS), which basically consists of two segments, American and Russian.

The head of Roscosmos recently warned of the effect of sanctions on the Russian side, whose Progress spacecraft is used to keep the station in its orbit.

Experts agree to minimize this threat, and Mr. Aschbacher said Thursday that "operations there are stable and secure".

© 2022 AFP