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OBERPFAFFENHOFEN, Germany --The European Space Agency (ESA) is negotiating with the Russian Space Agency on a six-month mission to the international space station for an ESA astronaut, ESA's space station chief Jorg E. Feustel-Buechl said Oct. 19.

The flight would follow the planned April launch of ESA astronaut Roberto Vittori, who will spend eight days at the station as part of an ESA-negotiated, Italian-government-financed mission costing 12.5 million euros ($15.6 million).

It will be Vittori's second "taxi" mission to the station after a May 2002 flight. On these missions, ESA or other commercial customers take advantage of a vacant third seat in Russia's Soyuz capsule to ride to the station during regular crew changes. After an eight-day visit, they return to Earth with the two-member station crew whose six-month shift has ended.

Vittori's April flight will be the fifth such ESA-negotiated mission.

In an interview here following the inauguration of ESA's Columbus Control Center, which will manage the use of Europe's planned space station laboratory, Feustel-Buechl said the sixth ESA agreement with Russia, now being negotiated, would be financed by the agency itself and not one of its member states. For the Vittori flight, the Italian Air Force and the Lazio regional government around Rome are paying the flight ticket.

Short-duration flights aboard Russian Russia's Soyuz vehicles are one way ESA is trying to maintain its manned space flight effort despite the two-year delay in the launch of its the Columbus habitable laboratory. Columbus is to be launched aboard the U.S. space shuttle and is one of many space station hardware components awaiting the shuttle fleet's return to flight.