Updates Soyuz-ST launch complex in Kourou

[tblaxland]

Click here for full article with photos.

Its strange to see a Soyuz being stacked in tee shirts

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Its strange to see a Soyuz being stacked in tee shirts

It will be even stranger to see it launch amid palm trees!

-----

Spaceflight Now: "First Soyuz rockets put together in South America".

 

[N_Molson]

Kourou is only 5° from the equator. From there, the R-7 will be able to bring 1360 kg payloads to GSO ! :thumbup:

 

[SiberianTiger]

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20100514/159015469.html

12:1114/05/2010


The first launch of a Russian Soyuz-ST carrier rocket from the Kourou space center in French Guiana has been scheduled for December 17, Russia's top space official said on Friday.


Russia's Federal Space Agency Roscosmos and French satellite launch firm Arianespace signed a contract in 2008 to launch 10 Russian Soyuz-ST carrier rockets from Kourou. The first launch will take the Hylas-1 commercial satellite into orbit.


"The current official date is December 17," Roscosmos head Anatoly Perminov said on Russian television following his recent visit to the Kourou space center.


Parts of two Soyuz-ST rockets, modernized versions of the Soyuz-2 rocket developed specifically for launches from the Kourou space center, were delivered to French Guiana last year.


The Kourou launch site is intended mainly for the launch of geostationary satellites. Its proximity to the Equator will enable the Soyuz-ST to put into orbit heavier satellites than those launched from Baikonur in Kazakhstan and Plesetsk in northern Russia.


MOSCOW, May 14 (RIA Novosti)

 

[SiberianTiger]

http://www.lepoint.fr/actualites-mo...ick-d-escatha-president-du-cnes/1648/0/458403

Google translated:

Have you not met with great difficulty to come to an agreement on the technical details of shooting?

Indeed, we have different methods. For example, the procedures in case of fire incident. When we risk losing control of a launcher, we decide in a second and a half to blow the fuse. Thus, the population not at risk. And we can not stop the burning of the powder ... The Soyuz are liquid propellant. So they do not destroy and cut off the arrival of the propellant. Thus, the whole rocket fell and crashed. But their process is automatic. An onboard computer detects the abnormality, the risk analysis and cuts the engine without anthropogenic influences. We had to reach a compromise on this essential point: human intervention in the destruction. We accepted the process of cutting the propulsion, but we required to put people in the loop. So we have two solutions in parallel.

The Russians seem to be the French responsibility for delays, including the installation of the gantry. What, in your eyes?

The Russians have built the porch, a technique they had hitherto not practiced since their launches are preparing horizontally. The delays are due to the portico to the crisis experienced by the manufacturer. Everyone has made efforts together as a team, and the porch is almost finished. People work hard on both sides, and we'll get to the end of the year.


The date of December 17 would be difficult to hold. This timetable is realistic?

Yannick d'Escatha: With Mr Anatoly Perminov, head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, Sergei Ivanov, Deputy Prime Minister of Russia, and Alexander Beglov, deputy head of the administration of President Medvedev, we decided to make December 17th . True, that planning without a margin. It's very proactive planning of people, who want, and we are in the final straight. It's all about voluntarism and motivation. We will strengthen ways, work 3 x 8. By smashing together up, we'll get there.

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Here's an awesome image gallery showing the first Soyuz-ST being assembled at Kourou!

And here's a great HD video about the launch complex (in Russian).​

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

SpaceRef: "Roscosmos and Arianespace Signed Contract for Launch of 10 Soyuz-ST's from CSG".

Totally, 24 Soyuzes are to fly from French Guiana, including those ordered today.

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Spaceflight Now: "Workers put finishing touches on Soyuz launch pad".

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Arianespace: "Spaceport welcomes its new liquid oxygen and liquid nitrogen production facility".

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Space News: "First Flight of European Soyuz Delayed Again".

 

[orb]

Spaceflight Now: Soyuz, Vega flights from French Guiana set for 2011:

The first flight of the Russian Soyuz rocket from South America will occur in early 2011 and Europe's smaller solid-fueled launcher will not debut until at least the middle of next year, according to Arianespace's chief executive.
...

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

RIA Novosti: "First Kourou launch of Soyuz-ST rocket could be March 2011".

 

[orb]

Spaceflight Now:
Soyuz launch pad moves closer to flight readiness

PRAGUE -- A committee of Russian and European officials will meet in October to assess the status of the behind-schedule Soyuz launch facility in French Guiana and decide when it could be ready to support flights of the storied rocket.

Jean-Jacques Dordain, the European Space Agency's director general, said institutional and industrial representatives will meet Oct. 12 discuss the development of a dedicated Soyuz launch pad at the Guiana Space Center.

Set in the French Guiana jungle near Kourou, the French-controlled facility is also home to the Ariane 5 rocket.

"I can tell you that the availability of Soyuz for the first launch will be decided on the 12th of October," Dordain told reporters here Monday.

Officials have not settled on a payload for the first flight. The candidates include the French Pleiades Earth observation satellite or the first two validation satellites for Europe's Galileo navigation system.

Dordain said the Galileo payloads won't be ready until July, pushing the Soyuz flight until the middle of 2011 if it has to wait on those spacecraft.

Two Soyuz rockets have been stored in Kourou since November 2009, waiting for the ground systems to be ready for preflight testing and launch.

Assembly of the mobile gantry triggered a delay of more than a year after Russian contractors ran into problems manufacturing and assembling more than 300 beams comprising the structure.

Officials say the delays added nearly 40 percent to the original cost of the program to move commercial Soyuz launches to Kourou. The total cost is now estimated to be $475 million at 2002 values, equivalent to nearly $600 million today.

"We would do it completely differently if we had to redo this project," said Jean-Marc Astorg, the coordinator of the Soyuz project in Kourou for CNES, the French space agency.

A Russian company named NIISK, formerly called KBOM, is overseeing construction at the brand new launch site on the northwest side of the sprawling space center.

"The mobile gantry does not exist at the launch pad in Russia," Astorg said.

Launch pad designers added the gantry to protect the Soyuz from rain and humidity in Kourou.

ESA oversees Soyuz development in Kourou, while CNES acts as prime contractor. Arianespace will be responsible for commercial exploitation and manages the relationship with Russian organizations, including Roscosmos.

In a sign of renewed commitment to the project, Anatoly Perminov, chief of the Russian space agency, said Monday his top priority for international cooperation is the completion of the Soyuz facilities in French Guiana.

"It is most critical is to finish the construction work on the Soyuz launch (pad) in French Guiana," Perminov said here. "Our second task is the International Space Station."

The entire mobile service tower was assembled in Russia before it was shipped to South America, adding more time to the schedule.

"Each beam is put on the structure, is cut, then welded," Astorg said. "That is why it took so long. It was necessary to dismount that, and to ship it to (Kourou), then find the right beam to put at the right place, which was quite a challenge."

It took another nine or 10 months to put the gantry back together in French Guiana, even with technicians working day and night, according to Astorg.

"It's almost finished," Astorg said. "What is important is we've been able to start the integration of European equipment into the mobile gantry from May of this year. The integration of the structure is no longer on the critical path."

Astorg identified constraining export control regulations as another weakness in the Soyuz partnership.

"Export control is a major concern," Astorg said. "Sometimes we are forced to wait two months before getting technical notes."

"Communication is still a problem, not only because of the language but because of the culture and so on," Astorg said. "And also the decision-making process is quite different in Russia and in Europe."

This fall, engineers will finish a series of mechanical, gas and propellant tests on the launch pad. The gantry will also be moved on rails to demonstrate its mobility.

If the facility is technically qualified by December, as currently scheduled, a Soyuz booster could be rolled 650 meters in early 2011 from the integration hall to the launch pad.

Astorg said engineers will not load super-cold liquid oxygen propellant into the Soyuz rocket before the first launch countdown. The Soyuz is only designed for 51 hours in cryogenic conditions, Astorg said.

The rocket will instead be fueled for the first time on launch day as a final exercise of the pad's propellant systems.

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

ESA: "Soyuz launch facility nears completion".

Space News: "Hurdles to European Soyuz Were Higher than Expected".

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Soyuz, the medium launcher.
The first launch of Soyuz from the Guiana Space Center is scheduled for April 2011. Arianespace’s customers have expressed their confidence in this new system by signing 18 launch contracts to date. Arianespace has therefore ordered 24 launchers from Russian industry, with the first two already delivered to CSG. The Soyuz launch complex (ELS) will be handed over to Arianespace by the end of 2010 and, following the inaugural launch in April 2011, two more Soyuz launches are scheduled by the end of that year.

Furthermore, since 1999, Starsem, the European-Russian subsidiary of Arianespace, has operated Soyuz from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. It has carried out 21 commercial launches to date, all successful, with the next launch planned on October 19.

Source.

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

First launch now NET June 2011.

Via RussianSpaceWeb:

In the meantime, by September, Russian and European space officials publicly admitted that the first Soyuz mission from Kourou could take place in the first quarter of 2011, the earliest. At the time, sources within the industry were saying that even that deadline would be very difficult to meet. Just a month later in October 2010, Russian sources have said that even June 2011 launch date could be too optimistic. At the time, the so-called "dry" rollout (without fueling) of the launch vehicle to the pad and the integrated testing of the launch facility with the rocket had both been re-scheduled for 2011. A combination of delays with available payloads and the completion of the launch facility pushed the first Soyuz mission from Kourou to June 2011, under best circumstances.

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

Roscosmos PAO: "Construction of Soyuz Launch Pad at Guiana Space Center (photos)".

Russian space industry (TSENKI, TsSKB-Progress, Lavochkin R&D and others) have completed construction and commissioning of the Soyuz launch pad at Guiana Space Center.
The maiden launch of Russian Soyuz from French Guiana is to occur in early 2011, Arianespace Chiarman Jean Ives Le Gall stated earlier.
According to him, the Soyuz’es payload is to be defined by the end of the year. The options include French Pleiades 1, Chilean Earth observation platform SSOT, the first satellite IOV for European navigation system Galileo, etc. The choice is to be made by the French party in the nearest months.
The Soyuz rocket launched from CSG will be featured by higher lifting capacity than those flown from Baikonur, due to Kourou’s location close to equator. The project has started in 2003, under the Russian French space agreement.

More images can be found here.

 

[tblaxland]

I couldn't see a map of the site in this thread. As far as I can tell, the site is located here:
[ame="http://maps.google.com/maps?t=h&q=5.292075,-52.828918&ll=5.292075,-52.828918&spn=0.030596,0.039997"]5.292075,-52.828918 - Google Maps[/ame]
Can anyone confirm it?

 

[N_Molson]

The Soyuz launchpad is the letter F on this map (French)

 

[kolich]

I couldn't see a map of the site in this thread. As fGoogle Maps[/url]
Can anyone confirm it?

Your location is almost correct.
Here is the satellite image: