MOSCOW. June 4 (Interfax-AVN) - The maiden test launch of a light Angara launch vehicle from the Plesetsk space center is scheduled for June 25, 2014, the Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) press service said.
"The maiden launch of a light Angara rocket from the Plesetsk spaceport has been planned for June 25, 2014. This is a next-generation modular rocket with oxygen-kerosene engines," says a report posted on the Roscosmos website on Wednesday.
Roscosmos chief Oleg Ostapenko said earlier the preparations to launch light and heavy Angara rockets would meet the deadlines.
A universal family of light, medium and heavy-lift Angara launchers is being developed for lifting into orbit practically the entire range of payloads of the Russian Defense Ministry in the designated range of altitudes and orbit inclinations, including the geostationary orbit, and for guaranteeing the genuine independence of Russian military space programs.
Angara launchers will not be using aggressive or toxic fuel, which will significantly improve environmental safety both in the areas around the spaceport and in the zone where rocket fragments fall.
An Angara mockup was brought to a launch site in November 2013 for testing cargo size parameters, and an Angara 1.2 prototype built for ground tests of launch hardware was successfully tested at a universal launch site in February 2014.