Article Posted on : - Apr 07, 2011

An artistic concept of the future spaceship.

KOROLEV (Itar-Tass): Russia's Rocket and Space Corporation Energia will present a mock-up of a new spaceship for manned missions at the upcoming MAKS-2011 airspace show in Zhukovsky on August.

"There will be a mock-up but not a full-size one," Energia President Vitaly Lopota said at a press conference after the docking of Soyuz TMA-21 to the International Space Station, April 7.

"We have time, we are going by schedule and working on new materials and technologies that will be used in the new ship," he said.

A concept of the future spaceship was presented last summer.

It is believed that the system will consist of the basic piloted spaceship and several of its modifications. The basic ship will be used for servicing orbiting stations, transporting crews and cargoes to and from them and also for rescue missions.

Its modifications will be intended for specific tasks such as missions to the Moon, servicing and repairing satellites in near-Earth orbits, autonomous flights, as long as one month, for research and experiments, as well as for delivering and returning cargoes.

Lopota earlier called for accelerated development of a new space system for manned missions.

The system consisting of a spaceship and a carrier rocket should be ready for launch from the Vostochny spaceport in the Amur region, Russian Far East, by 2015, Lopota said.