Plesetsk Cosmodrome is a Russian spaceport located in Mirny, Arkhangelsk Oblast, about 800 km north of Moscow and approximately 200 km south of Arkhangelsk. As of 2024, it is Europe's only operational orbital spaceport and the northernmost spaceport in the world. Originally developed as an ICBM site for the R-7 missile, it also served for numerous satellite launches using the R-7 and other rockets. Its high latitude makes it useful only for certain types of launches, especially the Molniya orbits, so for much of the site's history it functioned as a secondary location, with most orbital launches taking place from Baikonur, in the Kazakh SSR. With the end of the Soviet Union, Baikonur became a foreign territory, and Kazakhstan charged $115 million usage fees annually. Consequently, Plesetsk has seen considerably more activity since the 2000s.
Sea Launch was a multinational—Norway, Russia, Ukraine, United States—spacecraft launch company founded in 1995 that provided orbital launch services from 1999 to 2014. The company used a mobile maritime launch platform for equatorial launches of commercial payloads on specialized Zenit-3SL rockets from a former mobile/floating oil drilling rig renamed Odyssey.
Zenit was a family of space launch vehicles designed by the Yuzhnoye Design Bureau in Dnipro, Ukraine, which was then part of the Soviet Union. Zenit was originally built in the 1980s for two purposes: as a liquid rocket booster for the Energia rocket and, equipped with a second stage, as a stand-alone middle-weight launcher with a payload greater than the 7 tonnes of the Soyuz but smaller than the 20 tonnes payload of the Proton. The last rocket family developed in the USSR, the Zenit was intended as an eventual replacement for the dated Soyuz and Proton families, and it would employ propellants which were safer and less toxic than the Proton's nitrogen tetroxide/UDMH mix. Zenit was planned to take over crewed spaceship launches from Soyuz, but these plans were abandoned after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
The Tsyklon, GRAU index 11K67, was a Soviet-designed expendable launch system, primarily used to put Cosmos satellites into low Earth orbit in the late-1960s. It is based on the R-36 intercontinental ballistic missile designed by Mikhail Yangel and made eight launches, with seven successes and one failure. All of its launches were conducted from LC-90 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. It is sometimes designated Tsyklon-2A, not to be confused with the later Tsyklon-2 rocket. It was introduced in 1967 and was derived from the R-36 ICBM. It was retired in 1969.
The Dnepr rocket was a space launch vehicle named after the Dnieper River. It was a converted ICBM used for launching artificial satellites into orbit, operated by launch service provider ISC Kosmotras. The first launch, on April 21, 1999, successfully placed UoSAT-12, a 350 kg demonstration mini-satellite, into a 650 km circular Low Earth orbit.
The State Space Agency of Ukraine is the Ukrainian government agency responsible for space policy and programs. Along with the Ukrainian Defense Industry and the Antonov Aeronautical Scientific-Technical Complex, it is a major state complex of the national defense industry of Ukraine.The agency was formed in 1992 based on the Soviet space program infrastructure remaining in Ukraine following the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
The Kosmos rockets were a series of Soviet and subsequently Russian rockets, derived from the R-12 and R-14 missiles, the best known of which is the Kosmos-3M, which has made over 440 launches. The Kosmos family contained a number of rockets, both carrier rockets and sounding rockets, for orbital and sub-orbital spaceflight respectively. The first variant, the Kosmos-2I, first flew on 27 October 1961. Over 700 Kosmos rockets have been launched overall.
The Zenit-2M, Zenit-2SB, Zenit-2SLB or Zenit-2FG was a Ukrainian expendable carrier rocket derived from the Zenit-3SL. It was a member of the Zenit family of rockets, which were designed by the Yuzhmash.
Land Launch refers to a service product of Sea Launch SA. There is no entity or company called Land Launch. Sea Launch created the Land Launch offering to address lighter satellites directly into geosynchronous orbit or into geosynchronous transfer orbit, while Sea Launch continues to address the heavy satellite launch market.
The Zenit-2 was a Ukrainian, previously Soviet, expendable carrier rocket. First flown in 1985, it has been launched 37 times, with 6 failures. It is a member of the Zenit family of rockets and was designed by the Yuzhmash.
The Badr-B is the second spacecraft and the first Earth observation satellite launched into Earth orbit on 10 December 2001 at 09:15 by the SUPARCO — Pakistan's national space agency. Badr-B is a microsatellite, with a mass of ~70 kg, and contained the computerized system to conduct the studies on the gravity gradient. Badr-B is a research satellite to explore the upper atmosphere and the near space, and carried a large array of instruments for geophysical research.
Yantar were a series of Russian reconnaissance satellites, which supplemented and eventually replaced the Zenit spacecraft. Kosmos 2175, a Yantar-4K2 or Kobalt spacecraft, was the first satellite to be launched by the Russian Federation following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Yantar-Terilen was the first real-time digital system. Yantar satellites also formed the basis for the later Orlets, Resurs and Persona satellites. 179 have been launched, nine of which were lost in launch failures. All Yantar satellites were launched using the Soyuz-U carrier rocket until Kosmos 2480 in 2012 which was announced as the last launch of that rocket from Plesetsk. Subsequent launches used the modernized Soyuz-2.1a rocket. The last Yantar mission was Kosmos 2505, a Yantar-4K2M or Kobalt-M, launched on 5 June 2015. Reconnaissance missions have been taken over by the Persona class of satellites.
The Zenit-3F, Zenit-3SLBF or Zenit-2SB/Fregat was an expendable carrier rocket. It was a member of the Zenit family of rockets, which were designed by Yuzhnoye Design Bureau of Ukraine.
Intelsat 15, also known as IS-15, is a communications satellite owned by Intelsat. Intelsat 15 was built by Orbital Sciences Corporation, on a Star-2.4. It is located at 85° E longitude on the geostationary orbit. It was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome to a geosynchronous transfer orbit on 30 November 2009 by a Zenit-3SLB launch vehicle. It has 22 active Ku band transponders, plus eight spares. Five of those transponders are owned and operated by SKY Perfect JSAT Group under the name JCSAT-85.
Elektro–L is a series of meteorological satellites developed for the Russian Federal Space Agency by NPO Lavochkin. The first satellite, Elektro-L No.1, was launched on 2 January 2011. It is the first Russian weather satellite that successfully operates in geostationary orbit, and is currently the second operational Russian weather satellite. The satellites have a mass of about 1620 kg and are designed to operate for 10 years each. They are capable of producing images of the Earth's whole hemisphere in both visible and infrared frequencies, providing data for climate change and ocean monitoring in addition to their primary weather forecasting role.
Elektro-L No.1, also known as Geostationary Operational Meteorological Satellite No.2 or GOMS No.2, is a Russian geostationary weather satellite which was launched in 2011. The first Elektro-L spacecraft to fly, it became the first Russian geostationary weather satellite to be launched since Elektro No.1 in 1994.
Kosmos 2379 is a Russian US-KMO missile early warning satellite which was launched in 2001 as part of the Russian Space Forces' Oko programme. The satellite is designed to identify missile launches using infrared telescopes.
Kosmos 2397 is a Russian US-KMO missile early warning satellite which was launched in 2003 as part of the Russian Space Forces' Oko programme. The satellite is designed to identify missile launches using infrared telescopes.
Irtysh, also named Soyuz-5, formerly codenamed Fenix in Russian and Sunkar in Kazakh, is a planned Russian rocket that is being developed by JSC SRC Progress within the "Project Feniks". Initially it will replace the capability of Zenit-2 and Proton Medium, and in the future will serve as the base of a super heavy-lift launch vehicle rocket (Yenisei) to match the Energia/Buran capabilities. As of August 2023, Irtysh is expected to launch from the Baikonur Baiterek, the ex Zenit-2 launch site, in a partnership with the government of Kazakhstan, with a planned debut in December 2025.
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