MOSCOW, December 23. /TASS/. Russia’s State Space Corporation Roscosmos intends to launch a new Angara carrier rocket in 2020, the Roscosmos press office told TASS on Monday.

The Angara’s launch was previously scheduled for December 2019.

"Next year, we are planning to resume the launches of the Angara carrier rocket. The launch vehicle will be delivered by the Khrunichev Center in the first quarter of 2020," the press office said.

All necessary organizational and technological measures have been scheduled to make the Angara a commercial spacecraft through the launch of its serial production in Omsk in Siberia. There are plans to produce eight Angara-A5 rockets (including its crewed version) and two light-class Angara-1.2 carriers a year after the enterprise reaches its designed capacity, Roscosmos specified.

The Khrunichev Center reported in the summer of 2018 that it had already launched preparations for the rocket’s blastoff.

The Angara is a family of next-generation Russian space rockets. It consists of light, medium and heavy carrier rockets with a lifting capacity of up to 37.5 tonnes. The new family of rockets uses environmentally-friendly propellant components. So far, Russia has carried out only two Angara launches, both of them from the Plesetsk spaceport: a light Angara-1.2PP blasted off in July 2014 and its heavy version lifted off in December 2014.