MOSCOW. Dec 22 (Interfax) - The Rocket and Space Corporation Energia has sent the Orion upper stage to the Vostochny Cosmodrome for comprehensive and flight testing of an Angara carrier rocket, Roscosmos said on Friday.
"RSC Energia has finished manufacturing the upper stage in its flight-technological version, designed for comprehensive testing of an Orion upper-stage complex and flight tests of the Amur space-rocket complex," the press service said in a statement.
The Orion was sent to Vostochny on December 22, it said.
The rocket's electrical mockup Angara-NZh was successfully tested at the cosmodrome on December 11.
On November 28, Roscosmos First Deputy General Director Andrei Yelchaninov said that the first launch of the Angara-A5 rocket from Vostochny was scheduled for the first quarter of 2024. Previously, the first launch of an Angara carrier rocket, as part of flight tests from Vostochny Cosmodrome, was slated to take place in December 2023.
Angara is a family of Russia's modular-type launch vehicles with various lifting capacities based on universal rocket modules with oxygen-kerosene engines. The rockets range from light to super-heavy with a lifting capacity of 3.5 tonnes (Angara-1.2) to 38 tonnes (Angara-A5V) on a low near-Earth orbit.