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ESA Turns to Russia for Help with ExoMars

NASA recently backed out of the ambitious project

Oct 17, 2011 07:02 GMT  ·  By
This is how the ExoMars rover looked like in 2006. At this point, it is just a shadow of its former self
   This is how the ExoMars rover looked like in 2006. At this point, it is just a shadow of its former self

Due to a crippling lack of funding, the American space agency has recently decided to back out of the ExoMars mission the European Space Agency (ESA) had planned to go to the Red Planet. As a result, ESA is now turning to the Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos) for help.

The Director-General of the European agency, Jean-Jacques Dordain, announced on October 13 that this is one of the last attempts to keep the project going. Since its inception, the endeavor has been plagued with a large number of budget cuts and downsizing, which severely affects its functionality.

At this point, the Europeans don't really have much of a choice if they want to launch ExoMars. They can either partner with RosCosmos, or attempt to launch the vehicle on their own. In the latter scenario, mission capabilities will again have to be slashed in half, in order to keep costs down.

NASA still plans to supply ESA with an Atlas V delivery system for the planned 2018 launch, but the European agency is not sure whether the economic crisis will allow the Americans to keep their words, Universe Today reports.