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Russia's new Angara rocket costs to fall below those of Protons as of 2021 — manufacturer

Proton-M carrier rockets will be produced till 2025

Proton-M carrier rocket (archive) ITAR-TASS/Oleg Urusov

Proton-M carrier rocket (archive)

© ITAR-TASS/Oleg Urusov

OMSK, June 3. /TASS/. The manufacturing costs of the Angara space rocket will fall below those of the Proton-M as of 2021, the chief of the Khrunichev Centre, Andrey Kalinovsky, said on Wednesday.

"According to our estimates, when Angara’s batch production begins in 2021, the costs will be lower than those of Protons," he said.

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"Today’s costs of Angara are rather high, but we have a clear understanding of the future product’s real costs," Kalinovsky said.

Angara is a family or Russia-designed next generation space rockets. Two models - light Angara-1.2 and heavy Angara-A5 made maiden flights last year. It is expected that a future modification of the heavy Angara rocket will be used in Russia’s lunar program.

According to Kalinovsky, Proton-M carrier rockets will be produced till 2025.

"We’ll produce Protons till 2025. They will be the main product to provide for our enterprise’s operations until 2020," he said at a meeting held in the Siberian city of Omsk by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin.

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