MOSCOW, December 21, (TAR-TASS). Russia’s heavy-class rocket Angara carrying manned spacecraft will be launched from the Vostochny cosmodrome, the Amur region in Russia’s Far East, in 2018, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said in an interview with Rossiya 24 television channel.
“By 2018 we should be absolutely ready, we have such plans and they will be translated into reality,” he said. “We will make a manned flight on heavy-class Angara from the second launch pad of the Vostochny cosmodrome.”
He recalled that the Russian president signed a schedule for creating rocket complexes - light-class Angara and heavy-class Angara.
“Light-class carrier rocket Angara had already been delivered to the Plesetsk cosmodrome (in the Arkhangelsk region, northern Russia). It is now undergoing tests,” Rogozin said. “We plan that already next year we will make the first launch of light-class Angara. In compliance with the schedule this will be May-June 2014. By the end of next year we should launch heavy-class Angara from Plesetsk.