Yesterday the Russian Angara carrier rocket has successfully completed its first test launch from Plesetsk Cosmodrome, about 800 km (about 500 miles) north of Moscow. About 21 minutes after the launch, the second stage reached the Kamchatka Peninsula, the area ​​far north-west area of Russia, where it fell down as expected. It was a test of the rocket, which carried no actual payloads but only a dummy that was used to simulate them.

So far, Russia has always used types of launchers developed in the days of the USSR, versions updated over time of projects by Sergey Korolev, the father of the Soviet space program. The Russian government started the Angara project in the mid-90s but only in recent years the Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center that is developing managed to actually start building it.

For Russia, the family of Angara rockets will represent a huge step forward for various reasons. In recent years, in particular the Proton rockets had several problems and the result has been the failure of some launches with the loss of several satellites. The Proton uses a toxic propellant and this is a big problem when a launch fails and there is a risk of contaminating the area where the rocket crashes.

The Angara rockets uses a first stage of Universal Rocket Modules 1 (URM-1) type, which uses as propellant RP-1, a highly refined form of kerosene, and liquid oxygen as the oxidizer. More URM-1 modules may be connected to the first one to be used as booster for a total of 3 or 5 URM-1 modules. The second stage of the Angara is derived from the Block I stage of the Souyz 2, is called URM-2 and uses the same propellant as the URM-1. The optional third stage of some configurations will be the Briz-M now used for the Proton or a new model called KVTK, still in its development phase.

The Angara rocket tested yesterday was the 1.2PP version, a basic two-stage configuration with a single URM-1 stage. The launch was attempted a first time on June 27 and then the next day but in both cases there were problems. President Putin, who followed the operations live, recommended to take the time needed to succeed. Putin is well aware of the importance of the development of the Angara rockets for Russia.

Yesterday’s launch was broadcast neither on TV nor on the Internet. Only later, official sources informed that he it was successful and had pictures of the event published. The use of the Plesetsk Cosmodrome also aims to reduce the Russian dependence from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, currently used for launches of Russian rockets. According to official statements, in December the launch of a rocket Angara 5 could be tested, a version with 4 boosters and the third stage.

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