NASA paid Russia four billion dollars for the ISS flight
Over the past two decades on the International space station (ISS) astronauts visited 239 National management of the USA on Aeronautics and space research (NASA). For 70 of them bought seats on Russian space ships "Soyuz".
As stated in a report published Thursday report to NASA, as of July 2019 "ticket" to space on Soyuz's budget was worth US $ 3.9 bn. The paper noted that after the closure of the space Shuttle program in 2011, astronauts from the USA went into space only on the Russian ships.
In 2010 , NASA initiated agreements with aerospace companies in the U.S. on the development of commercial technologies and subsystems transportation of crew to ensure safety, reliability, and cost-effective transportation to the ISS. As of August 2019, the Directorate allocated approximately $ 5.5 billion for the implementation of this program.
On a new American space ship work Boeing and SpaceX, it is expected that by 2024 they will be able to deliver to the ISS at least 48 astronauts. After more than 2 years of delays, both the contractor preparing to conduct manned test flights to the end of 2019.
However, if Boeing and SpaceX will not be ready to send astronauts to the ISS by April 2020, NASA will have to reduce the number of its astronauts to the station until one reads the document.
"This will have a negative impact on important research activities at the station and on the critical services of the ISS, including the installation of new lithium-ion batteries", - stated in the document.
Earlier, the head of the Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, said that NASA asked for additional seats on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft in this and next year.