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First Angara carrier rocket expected at Vostochny spaceport this fall

Alexey Varochko, General Director of the Khrunichev Center, previously reported that the flight test program for the Angara-A5 heavy launch vehicle provides for a total of six launches

MOSCOW, July 31. /TASS/. The first Angara-A5 carrier rocket, intended for the Vostochny Cosmodrome, is still under construction and is expected to be shipped to the spaceport this fall, Director General of the Khrunichev Center Alexey Varochko told TASS.

"The construction of the first Angara-A5 carrier rocket for the Vostochny cosmodrome is continuing according to schedule. <...> Sending the product to the cosmodrome to prepare it for launch is planned for this fall," Varochko said.

Varochko told TASS earlier that the program for flight-testing the heavy launch vehicle Angara-A5 envisages a total of six launches. "The flight test program provides for six launches of Angara-A5 heavy launch vehicles. Three successful launches took place in 2014, 2020 and 2021 respectively," Varochko noted.

Angara is a family of Russian launch vehicles from light to heavy classes using environmentally friendly fuel components. The first Angara rocket (light configuration) blasted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome on July 9, 2014. On December 23, 2014, a heavy Angara-A5 performed its first test flight from Plesetsk.

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