Skip to content

By Roger Highfield on

UK backs human space exploration

A few months ahead of the launch of the museum’s pioneering Cosmonauts space exhibition, the UK Space Agency has published its first National Strategy for Space Environments and Human Spaceflight.

A few months ahead of the launch of the museum’s pioneering Cosmonauts exhibition, the UK Space Agency has published its first National Strategy for Space Environments and Human Spaceflight.

Major Tim Peake visits the Exploring Space gallery at the Science Museum to mark the announcement that Tim Peake is to be first British astronaut in space for more than 20 years. The Former Apache helicopter pilot will visit the International Space Station © Science Museum
Tim Peake at the Science Museum. © Science Museum

The report’s promise of greater involvement in crewed missions shows that Conservative Government thinking has shifted light years since 1987, when Roy Gibson quit as UK space chief after his spending proposals were vetoed, and the then Trade Secretary, Kenneth Clarke, declared the Government did not want to contribute to a mission to put a Frenchman into space.

Until now, the UK has preferred to focus on the commercial and scientific aspects of spaceflight through its satellite-building industry and its membership of the European Space Agency (ESA).

However, at the 2012 ESA Ministerial the UK Space Agency, established in 2010, made the UK’s first contribution to the International Space Station and ESA’s European Life and Physical Sciences Programme.

Last year the Agency pledged £49.2 million, which gives UK researchers access to the $100 billion International Space Station programme.

The new Strategy hints at even greater ambitions for UK manned missions: “The Agency will also consider its role in human exploration missions beyond Earth orbit.”

British ESA astronaut Tim Peake’s maiden voyage, which was announced at the Science Museum, is expected in December of this year and this six month mission will mark the first time that a British astronaut has visited the ISS in what will be a highly-visible demonstration of UK ambition for human spaceflight.

However, Peake will not be the first Briton in space: that honour goes to Helen Sharman, who was launched in 1991to spend a week in the Mir space station.

Dr Helen Sharman OBE PhD, (who became the first Briton in space) and Alexei Leonov prior to his talk in the Imax. In March 1965, Alexei Leonov stepped out of his Voskhod 2 spacecraft and into the history books as the first human to walk in space © Science Museum
Dr Helen Sharman OBE PhD, (who became the first Briton in space) and Alexei Leonov prior to his talk in the IMAX. In March 1965, Alexei Leonov stepped out of his Voskhod 2 spacecraft and into the history books as the first human to walk in space © Science Museum

Sharman was present a few weeks ago for the launch of Cosmonauts by the first spacewalker, twice hero of the Soviet Union, Alexei Leonov.

Cosmonauts opens at the Science Museum on September 18 with the most significant collection of Soviet era spacecraft and ephemera ever assembled in one place, including the single cosmonaut moon lander, which was used for training and was kept secret for many years; the first spacecraft to carry more than one human into space; and the descent module of the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova.

Helen Sharman will join me and television presenter Dallas Campbell in the Royal Institution on July 30 to discuss the story of the spacesuit. Her Zvezda spacesuit will be among the 150 exhibits on display in Cosmonauts, which celebrates a wide range of space firsts.

Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age opens at the Science Museum on 18 September 2015 until 13 March 2016.