Europe mulls human launch system

Industrial groups in Europe are about to look in detail at ideas for a new launch system to put humans in space.

The meetings have been convened by the European Space Agency (Esa) under a development study that involves Russia - with Japan also eager to contribute.

The discussions at industrial level will formally start in July.

Europe is keen to see a crew transport system that is independent of the US Orion vehicle, which is set to replace the space shuttles in the next decade.

The new Crew Space Transportation System (CSTS) could be an updated and enhanced version of the venerable Russian Soyuz approach or an entirely new concept.

"We need two transportation systems; we cannot rely on only one," said Daniel Sacotte, Esa's director of Human Spaceflight, Microgravity and Exploration.

"We want to have parallel systems, to be cooperative; so that if one system has a failure, there is another one that allows space exploration to continue," he told BBC News.

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