Europe’s space chief wants decision this year on launching without NASA

Europe’s space boss wants European countries to decide by the end of the year whether to launch astronauts without U.S. help. “We would like to strengthen our autonomy. The very visible part, which we are discussing, is whether we shall build up a European capability to bring astronauts to space with our own means,” the European Space Agency’s director general, Josef Aschbacher, said in an interview ahead of an international space summit in Paris this week. “That means with our rocket, our own crewed vehicle, our launch ... system, our operational system, the science, the recovery and everything that is attached to it, including the control centers operating the facilities,” he added.

Source: politico.eu