MOSCOW. April 3 (Interfax) - Roscosmos is interested in the development of S7's Sea Launch project, according to corporation head Dmitry Rogozin.
"Let us wait and see what happens, after all, Vladislav Filev is a big enthusiast of space exploration; this runs in the family. Hopefully, the project will live on. Apparently, Roscosmos might be more than a partner, or it may simply need to stretch out a helping hand," Rogozin said in a program aired by the radio station Komsomolskaya Pravda.
"I will do that after the mourning is over. We will meet with Vladislav, and I will offer him our full support. We are interested in the existence of private companies in Russia, and we are ready to share the risks," Rogozin said.
The co-owner of Russia's largest private aviation group S7 AirSpace Corporation (known as S7 Group before 2019), Natalia Fileva, and her father died in a business jet crash while landing at the Frankfurt Egelsbach Airport in Germany on March 31. Reasons for the plane crash are being investigated.
Energia Corporation sold its Sea Launch assets to S7 Group in April 2018.
The subject matter of the deal was the Sea Launch Commander ship, the Odyssey launch platform, ground-based equipment in the Long Beach port in the United States, and the Sea Launch trademark.
The company planned to launch spacecraft into orbit using Ukrainian Zenit rockets, but it was reported lately that a special modification of Russia's Soyuz 5 launch vehicle might be developed for Sea Launch on the basis of Zenit elements.
"We stayed in touch with Natalia in regard to cooperation with S7 Space. We planned to design a "sea-launched" modification of the Soyuz 5 rocket for Sea Launch. She was a huge enthusiast of aviation and cosmonautics, and her death is a personal tragedy for all of us," Rogozin said after Fileva died.