MOSCOW, November 7. /TASS/. The first rocket the company S7 Space is working on at the moment may take place in three years from now, the company’s chief, Sergey Sopov, told TASS in an interview, adding that the launch would be used for flight-testing a cargo spacecraft.
S7 Space is working on its own rocket on the basis of a sketch design of the Soyuz-5 launch vehicle being created by the space rocket corporation Energia.
"When we launch our new rocket for the first time, approximately in three years from now, we also plan to flight-test a cargo spacecraft. Roscosmos might order six space launches from us, thus keeping busy both its own enterprises and S7 Space," Sopov said.
Roscosmos has invited S7 Space to participate in creating the Soyuz-5 rocket.
"We agreed but we will be making our version of the rocket on our own on the basis of the Soyuz-5 project to suit our own tasks. Our company’s working name for the rocket is Soyuz-7 and Soyuz-7SL (Sea Launch). The first stage will be reusable," he said.
Sopov said S7 Space had begun to create its own launch vehicle project divisions. Igor Radugin is in charge of them (just recently he moved to S7 Space from Energia).
"The main purpose is to create a space transport system that we might use in the near future," he said.
According to earlier reports, Roscosmos approved, after amendments, a sketch design of Soyuz-5. The rocket will be used for putting the manned spacecraft Federatsiya into low near-Earth orbits. The main solutions and technologies created for the new launch vehicle will be used in designing a super-heavy class rocket.