MOSCOW, July 30 (AVN) - The state commission carried out a session on Monday at the Plesetsk cosmodrome and made a decision to launch the Tsiklon-3 booster rocket at 12.00 Moscow time (0800 GMT) on Tuesday, a spokesman for the Space Troops headquarters told the Military News Agency.
The decision was made after completion of additional inspections of the booster rocket, launch equipment and elimination of various troubles. Originally the launch was planned for July 25 but those troubles were the main reason for its postponement.
The booster rocket launch's peculiarity is the first time implemented concept of the launch without people participation when the preparation and launch happen in accordance with the single programme and completely automatically. The booster rocket will place the AUOS-SM-KF (Koronas-F) spacecraft on the orbit. The spacecraft as well as the booster rocket was produced by the Ukrainian Dnepropetrovsk-based Yuzhnoye research and production enterprise. The spacecraft was ordered by the Russian Academy of Sciences and was developed by specialists from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, France, Great Britain and the USA.
The previous spacecraft which is the AUOS-SM-KI (Koronas-I) was successfully placed on the orbit by the Tsiklon-3 booster rocket from the same consmodrome on March 2, 1994.