“Dnepr” booster designed on the basis of RS-20 “Voyevoda” intercontinental ballistic missile (SS-18 “Satan” according to NASA classification) set several foreign space devices of different purposes into the low-earth orbit.
“Dnepr” super-heavy conversion booster with satellites was successfully launched at 11.10 Moscoe time.
“All space devices successfully separated from the booster stage. The command was issued to take the booster away from the satellites. The launch went on nominally, – was reported from the observation point of Yasny launch base.
As a result of this launch the following space devices were orbited: DubaiSat-2 (OAE), STSAT-3 (the Republic of Korea), UniSat-5 (Italy), SkySat-1, AprizeSat-7/8 (USA), BRITE-PL, GOMX-1, WNISat (Toronto Institute for Aerospace Researches, Canada), 9 ISIPOD containers with CubeSat nanosatellites (The Netherlands) and BPA-3 payload (Ukraine).
It was the second “Dnepr” launch this year, late August “Dnepr” booster orbited South Korean Earth remote sensing satellite Kompsat-5.
“Dnepr” booster was designed on the basis of RS-20 intercontinental ballistic missile (SS-18 “Satan” according to NASA classification). “Dnepr” program was developed to utilize ballistic missiles with orbiting payload at that. To manage this project Roscosmos and Ukraine National Space Agency (Ukraine “Yuzhnoye” Design Bureau take part in re-equipment of the missiles to make space boosters out of combat ones ) formed international space company Cosmotras. Since 1991 8 “Dnepr” boosters orbited 63 space devices of 15 countries.
