MOSCOW. March 22 (Interfax) - Experts have removed a glitch in the ground equipment, due to which the launch of the Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome was postponed for two days, Glavcosmos said.
"A glitch in the ground support equipment of the Fregat upper stage, which led to the command to cancel the launch on March 20, has been identified and removed today. We are going to perform a launch as early as tomorrow," Glavcosmos, which is a subsidiary of the state corporation Roscosmos, in charge of its export and import operations, said on Twitter.
Initially the launch was scheduled for March 20; however, 38 minutes before liftoff Roscosmos said that it was postponed until a backup date, March 21. The launch was later postponed to Monday. Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin said on Saturday that March 22 as the launch date would be approved after an additional check.
The delay was due to technical reasons, the state corporation said. Rogozin told Interfax that no defects had been found in the carrier rocket.
The rocket was to put into orbit a South Korean Compact Advanced Satellite, CAS500-1, and a cluster of payload satellites. In all, 38 satellites are due to be launched.
Contracts for delivery in orbit of two South Korean-made satellites CAS500-1 and CAS500-2 were signed in 2017. Their chief mission is to take panchromatic and multispectral images using the AEISS-C payload.
The two satellites were due to be launched from Baikonur atop Soyuz-2.1a rockets with a Fregat upper stage. Initially, the launches had been scheduled for the third quarter of 2020.
According to Roscosmos data, the cluster of small satellites involves various formats, from PocketQube to those weighing 200 kilograms, which are being launched for customers in Japan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Italy, South Korea, Israel, Thailand, Canada, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands, Argentina, Hungary, United Kingdom, Spain, Slovakia, and Tunisia.