Shortly after that “close call” Russia announced there was a small hole in another Soyuz vehicle. The problem was more urgent since the space vehicle was already attached to the ISS. “We are able to narrow down the cause to a technological mistake of a technician,” Rogozin said at the time.
Future of the ISS
Now that all danger has apparently passed, the various space teams and their governments are trying to figure out who will remain involved in the ISS mission. NASA and the US want to maintain a human presence in low-orbit space for the next decade.
Russia’s space budget is likely taking a hit since NASA no longer needs to buy Soyuz seats for its astronauts to ride to the ISS. Because SpaceX has the Crew Dragon passenger vehicle which is ferrying the US’s astronauts.
In April, Roscosmos announced its plans to leave the ISS mission by 2025 and launch its own space station by 2030. They claimed “It does not mean that the station will be scrapped and dumped into the ocean immediately after 2025. We will simply hand over the responsibility for our segment to the partners.”
