Despite strained relations, the US still needs Russia to send astronauts into space.

Ignoring the tense bilateral diplomatic and political relations and mutual economic sanctions, on August 5, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) continued to cooperate with the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) by signing a contract to hire this unit to send American astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS).

It is known that the value of this contract is about 500 million USD.

NASA said the contract runs through 2019, extending a previously signed agreement that was set to expire in 2017.

Russia's TMA-17M spacecraft lifted off from the launch pad and entered orbit, beginning its journey toward the International Space Station (ISS). (Source: AFP/VNA)

Under this contract extension, the $490 million includes the cost of sending six US astronauts to the ISS using a Soyuz rocket.

At this cost, each seat on the Soyuz costs more than 80 million USD.

Explaining the above decision, NASA pointed out that the underlying cause comes from the fact that US lawmakers have not provided enough funding for the "Commercial Crew Program", a multi-phase plan to realize the US's ambition of deploying flights by US-made spacecraft by 2017.

The lack of funding has made it difficult for leading US companies such as Boeing and SpaceX to produce spacecraft in the past five years. This has forced NASA to continue to rely on the cooperation of its Russian partners.

The total cost for the implementation phases of the "Commercial Crew Program" is estimated at 1.24 billion USD.

In a letter to the US Congress, NASA chief Charles Bolden said the agency had hoped to conduct space flights by 2017.

However, the fact that lawmakers said "No" to the 2016 fiscal budget proposed by President Barack Obama, which included funding for the development program, has affected the plan to send American astronauts into space in the future.

After the end of the space shuttle development program in July 2012, NASA cooperated with Russia in sending American astronauts into space.

The contract extension with Roscosmos comes as Russia-US relations are at their lowest point since the Cold War over the Ukraine crisis.

The US has banned its companies from buying Russian-made rocket engines, including the RD-180 engine equipped for five Altas rockets of United Launch Alliance./.

According to VNA/VIETNAM+