Saint-Petersburg. June 16. INTERFAX - Members of the cosmonaut squad will join the new department of expertise, which will control the creation of spacecraft for manned cosmonautics, the head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, told reporters.
"Yesterday I signed the order before flying here to St. Petersburg. (...) We are creating a special department within the framework of the Scientific and Technical council of Roscosmos, consider it in the structure of the state corporation, and it will be called the department of special expertise in manned space exploration. The composition will include all members of the cosmonaut squad, " Rogozin said at a briefing at the GLEX-2021 space conference in St. Petersburg.
According to him, the members of the department can be assigned to certain enterprises, such as the Rocket and Space Corporation "Energia" or the rocket and space center "Progress".
"All these organizations will accept these representatives of ours, represented by cosmonauts, who will perform the functions of controlling the creation of new rocket and space technology in the interests of manned programs, "the head of Roscosmos added.
"The commander of the detachment (Oleg - IF) Kononenko, in addition to being appointed in the near future as deputy head of the flight training Center, simultaneously becomes the head of this department and the special representative of the Director General of Roscosmos for the manned program, "Rogozin said.
Earlier, the executive director of Roscosmos for manned programs, Sergey Krikalev, told Interfax that there will be changes in the structure of the Cosmonaut Training Center.
At the moment, the Roscosmos cosmonaut squad includes 32 people.
On February 9, the media reported that members of the cosmonaut squad asked the head of the state corporation Dmitry Rogozin to transfer the squad to the direct subordination of Roscosmos. Rogozin informed the head of state about this request.
According to media reports, the cosmonauts are dissatisfied with the decline in the quality of training, excessive bureaucratization and a large difference in the salaries of cosmonauts and the management of the Cosmonaut Training Center (CPC).
A few years ago, Gennady Padalka, the record holder for the total duration of space flights, left the cosmonaut squad. After leaving, he criticized the work of the CPC and a number of aspects of the Russian manned space program.
In April, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin announced a significant increase in the salaries of Russian cosmonauts.
