Marking a milestone in the timeline to flight operations, Russia's new Vostochny Cosmodrome has begun preflight inspections of its inaugural flight booster.
After completing a 4,100 mile train ride from its fabrication plant, the Soyuz 2-1a booster arrived at the Far East spaceport October 9. However, assembly of the processing plant was not yet completed, and the rocket remained in its transport containers until early 2016.
On January 20, technicians offloaded the rocket and began their initial inspections prior to integration. The Soyuz launch pad as Vostochny is still undergoing final assembly and outfitting, and spaceport managers hope to perform pad checkout operations by mid-March. The assembled vehicle would rollout shortly there after for integrated tests with the pad interface. It is hoped the vehicle would launch by the end of April, provided all tests were completed sufficiently.
The Soyuz 2-1a vehicle will be modified for its use at Vostochny. Internal supports have been added to aid the vehicle during its extended overland rail voyage, and additional valves have been added to drain excess propellants in the vehicle's tanks. This will allow the rocket to remain fueled and on the launch pad for up to four days.
The inaugural flight out of the new spaceport will be three satellites; the Lomonsov satellite as the primary, and the Aist-2D remote sensing satellite and SamSat-218 educational nanosatellite as secondary payloads. The latter should arrive at the launch site by the end of this week with the Lomonosov satellite due to arrive by February 1.
