MOSCOW, October 4. /TASS/. Russia’s Space Forces have tracked over 30 missile launches by various countries and issued almost 20 warnings of space objects’ dangerous approach to Russian satellites since the beginning of the year, the Defense Ministry’s press office reported on Friday.
"Over this year, the alert forces of the Russian missile early warning system and specialized space control and missile defense capabilities have detected over 30 launches of foreign and domestic ballistic missiles and space rockets," the press office said as Russia was celebrating Space Forces Day on October 4.
The history of Russia’s Space Forces dates back to October 4, 1957 when the Earth’s first artificial satellite was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
Also, specialists of Russia’s Space Forces have detected and locked on about 700 space objects, controlled the delivery of around 300 satellites into orbit and predicted the descent of over 200 space vehicles from the orbit since the beginning of the year.
"They have issued 19 warnings about the dangerous flybys of space objects near satellites of the Russian orbital grouping," the Defense Ministry’s press office stated.
Over this period, Russia’s Space Forces have paid special attention to control of the structure and the state of foreign satellites’ groupings and other countries’ experiments with their space vehicles, the ministry added.
Russia’s Titov Main Testing Space Center has provided for 16 space liftoffs from the Plesetsk, Vostochny and Baikonur spaceports since the beginning of this year, during which 22 satellites have been placed in orbit. Specifically, five space rockets, and also Yars and Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles were launched from the Plesetsk military cosmodrome, the Defense Ministry said.
Russia’s missile early warning system
Russia’s next-generation Voronezh radar stations are on combat duty in the Leningrad, Kaliningrad, Irkutsk, Orenburg, Altai, Krasnodar and Krasnoyarsk regions as part of the country’s missile early warning system.
"Work continues to create new missile warning radars in the Republic of Komi and the Murmansk Region. This work is set to be completed in 2022," the Defense Ministry reported.
Also, more than ten new laser-optical and radio-technical stations based on various principles of detecting and identifying space objects will be deployed on the territory of Russia by 2022, the ministry noted.
"The first next-generation laser-optical system is on experimental combat duty on the territory of the Altai Region to accomplish the tasks of outer space control," the Defense Ministry said.