European Space Agency Joins Russian-US Moon Flight Simulation Experiment - Project Manager

The European Space Agency, which comprises 22 member states, will join the Russian-US SIRIUS project, which models a flight to the Moon, and take part in the next stages of the experiment, Mark Belakovski, manager of the project, told reporters on Tuesday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 19th March, 2019) The European Space Agency, which comprises 22 member states, will join the Russian-US SIRIUS project, which models a flight to the Moon, and take part in the next stages of the experiment, Mark Belakovski, manager of the project, told reporters on Tuesday.

"Today we have received a letter from the European State Agency about its participation in the project. Their staffer will take part in the eight-month and year-long experiments," Belakovski said.

In 2016, the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian academy of Sciences and NASA signed a cooperation agreement to conduct a series of experiments dubbed SIRIUS.

The first stage of SIRIUS took place in November 2017 and lasted for 17 days.

A four-month experiment started in Moscow earlier in the day. It will reproduce the main stages of a real space flight to the Moon, including the flight itself, search for a landing site, landing, stay in the Moon's orbit, remote control of the lunar rover that will prepare the base and return to Earth.