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Duration of stay on Russian prospective orbital station limited to about 3 years — expert

In Vyacheslav Shurshakov' estimates, typical length of space missions to ROSS would be about 10-11 months

MOSCOW, June 22. /TASS/. Cosmonauts’ missions to Russia’s prospective orbital station ROSS (Russian Orbital Service Station) should not last longer than three plus years due to space radiation exposure, a senior Russian scientist has told TASS.

Vyacheslav Shurshakov, who heads the Radiation Safety of Manned Space Flights department at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), said levels of radiation exposure for cosmonauts staying aboard the International Space Station (ISS) permit flights that last up to four years.

"If we take ROSS, radiation levels there will be approximately 20% higher. If we stick to this logic, the period that a cosmonaut can spend there should be shorter by 20%, which is slightly more than three years," he said during a Roscosmos TV broadcast.

In his estimates, typical length of space missions to ROSS would be about 10-11 months.

Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin said earlier this month that the Russian space agency had reached a decision on orbit inclination and general layout of the future Russian space station ROSS.

In turn, Director of the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) Oleg Orlov said three options are being considered for the creation of the ROSS: a mid-latitude orbit with a tilt of 51.6 degrees based on the modules of the ISS’ Russian segment, an orbit with a tilt of 51.6 degrees based on the new modules and a polar orbit with a tilt of 96.8 degrees.