Space

DATE=02/27/03

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE=SHUTTLE / SPACE STATION (S)

NUMBER=2-300125

BYLINE=DAVID McALARY

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

CONTENT=

INTERNET=

INTRO: The United States and its international space station partners have agreed to use Russian spacecraft to exchange station crews as long as U-S space shuttles remain grounded after the Columbia accident. David McAlary reports that the size of the station crew will decrease.

TEXT: The U-S space agency, NASA, says the three-man U-S-Russian station crew will return to Earth in April aboard the Soyuz emergency escape craft that is based at the outpost.

To lessen demands for supplies, only two crewmembers will replace them. They will arrive on another Soyuz craft that will become a replacement escape vehicle.

NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe told a U-S House of Representatives committee that the two-person rotation will occur every six months during regularly planned Soyuz swaps until shuttles return to service.

He also says the schedule of Russian supply rocket visits is being accelerated.

A member of the House committee has introduced legislation to let NASA pay Russia to build additional Soyuz and Progress spacecraft to service the station.

The measure would amend a U-S law that bars such aid to Russia unless the Bush administration confirms that Moscow has not provided Iran with missile or weapons technology in the previous year. (SIGNED)

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