NASA has not been officially notified of Russia’s withdrawal from the International Space Station after 2024

NASA has not yet received “official” information about the Russians’ intention to leave the International Space Station (ISS) after 2024, a senior US space agency official said today.

“We have not received any official statement from our partner regarding today’s news,” Robin Gatens, director for the ISS at NASA, said this morning (local time) at a space conference in Washington. “So we will discuss their plans more.”

The United States wants to extend the ISS until 2030, but the new head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos announced today that Russia will stop participating in the program “after 2024”.

Asked if the United States would like to see the Russians withdraw from the ISS, Robin Gatens said: “No, absolutely not. They have been good partners, as all our partners are, and we want to continue together, as a partnership, to we operate the space station during the decade.”

The space station is the result of a huge international collaboration, and NASA has said many times that it cannot operate without the input of different partners.

Starting in 2030, NASA anticipates a transition to commercial stations, which it helps develop and whose services it wishes to lease when the ISS retires.

“The Russians, like all of us, are thinking about what’s next for them,” said Robin Gatens. “Just as we plan a post-2030 transition to commercial stations in low orbit, [έτσι κι εκείνοι] have a similar design. So they’re also thinking about that transition.”

Yuri Morisov, the head of Roscosmos, said today that the Russians are counting on building a “Russian satellite station”, which will be “the main priority” of the national space program.