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News briefs: May 25-27
Posted: Tue, May 28, 2002, 8:11 AM ET (1211 GMT)
- A clean room used by a French-Russian company suffered minor damage when additional sections of a hangar at Baikonur collapsed last week. The clean room in Building 112, site of a roof collapse that killed seven people earlier this month, is used by Starsem to prepare commercial payloads for launches on Soyuz boosters. The clean room suffered only "insignificant" damage, according to a Space News report, and the clean room is not needed until the launch next year ESA's Mars Express.
- The head of the Russian space agency Rosaviakosmos has proposed creating a Russian-American panel to coordinate the two countries' space efforts, Space News reported. Yuri Koptev said that such a permanent panel would monitor cooperation and help promote changes in aerospace policy in the two countries. The concept met with wide support during a meeting of Russian and American officials in Moscow last week.
- A proposed spaceport on Australia's Christmas Island is threatened by caves, according to one member of the Australian Parliament. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported Monday that Natasha Stott Despoja, head of the Australian Democrats party, claimed that the proposed site is unstable because of caverns. However, officials with the Asia Pacific Space Centre disputed the claim, saying there was no evidence of caverns at the site.
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