BLAGOVESHCHENSK, June 19. /TASS/. Installation of equipment for the carrier rocket prelaunch procedure has started at the command post of the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Amur region, the press service of Russia’s Special Construction Agency (Spetsstroy) reported on Friday.

"All the premises for the installation of the support equipment, assembly of the first floor of the command post of the Vostochny cosmodrome have been handed over to specialists of the Centre for Operation of Space Ground-Based Infrastructure (TsENKI). The equipment for the prelaunch preparation of the carrier rocket and giving the command for blast-off is now being mounted," the press service said.

The cosmodrome’s command post is located above ground and looks more like a concrete bunker. During carrier rocket launches the building will experience an 8-point seismic load, so it was designed and built with an extra margin of safety.

"The command post walls will be more than half a metre thick. More than 12,000 cubic metres of concrete mixture were used in its construction and more than 2,000 tonnes of reinforcement bars," the press service said.

Spetsstroy sources said that the command post is the launch complex’ ‘nerve centre.’ The facility is designed to process all the collected information about the status and readiness of technological and multipurpose support systems, on-board equipment and units of the launch vehicle and spacecraft, quality and the number of components of rocket fuels, special fluids and gases.

The control and test equipment of the prelaunch preparation of the space complex will be located at the command post.

The Vostochny cosmodrome construction was started near the town of Uglegorsk in the Amur region in 2010. It will become the country’s first civilian spaceport ensuring Russia’s full access to outer space.

The first launch from the Vostochny spaceport is planned to be carried out in late 2015.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said previously that the creation of the new spaceport Vostochny in the Far East should confirm Russia’s high scientific and technological status. In his opinion, the new spaceport should become "yet another strongpoint for the development of our Far East."

Vostochny should become operational in 2015 and start sending manned missions in 2018. The comsodrome is intended for launching automatic and piloted space missions under national, international and commercial programmes. By 2018, the spaceport should be ready to launch heavy Angara-5A rockets. The cosmodrome will also have infrastructure for future piloted missions.

The spaceport complex will include two launch facilities, an aerodrome, cosmonauts’ flight training facilities, an oxygen-nitrogen plant and hydrogen plant, 115 kilometres of automobile roads and 125 kilometres of railways and other facilities. The first rocket to be launched from Vostochny is to be the Soyuz-2.1a, made by the Progress Rocket and Space Centre. The carrier rocket will place into orbit the Samara satellite Aist-2, the SamSat-218 nanosatellite of the Samara State Aerospace University and the Lomonosov satellite of Moscow State University (MGU).