US space woes felt by Europe

Europe may have to find its own solutions for transporting astronauts and cargo to and from the International Space Station due to short-sighted US policies that now threaten Nasa's ability to maintain a presence on the orbital outpost.

Nasa chief Michael Griffin recently gave top managers a blunt assessment of the situation in an e-mail reprinted by the Orlando Sentinel, in which he said: "My own view is about as pessimistic as it is possible to be."

Fuelling Dr Griffin's frustration is a US policy to retire the space shuttle fleet in 2010, for safety and cost reasons, but five years before replacement ships are ready to take over the work of ferrying crews to the ISS.

The station also is solely dependent on Russia's Soyuz capsules to serve as lifeboats to bring astronauts back to Earth in case of an emergency.

The European Space Agency (Esa) had joined Nasa in designing a station crew-return vehicle based on the X-38 experimental craft, but it was never completed.

"That was cancelled by a US government decision when almost all the European components were ready or already delivered," Marco Caporicci, the head of the Esa's Future Space Transport and Infrastructure Division, wrote in an e-mail to BBC News.

continue....