Additional agreement for delivery of Soyuz-ST boosters to be launched form Kourou spaceport in French Guiana was signed, sourсe in space industry reported.
The contact stipulates for the delivery of 7 Soyuz boosters to the amount of 400 million US dollars, – he specified.
The source pointed out that the documents were signed before the first EU sanctions against Russia came into effect.
According to him while visiting Progress State Research and Production Space Centre European experts took a great interest in new Russian Soyuz-2.1v light booster adaptation for Soyuz launcing complex of Kourou spaceport. The fact that European light booster Vega turned out to be too expensive may be the possible reason of such interest.
Progress Director General Alexander Kirillin reported earlier that “on February 20-21 Arianspace company hold a meeting resulted in preparation of the Russian-French agreement on 7 additional Soyuz-ST boosters delivery for Kourou spaceport. According to him additional agreements signing were scheduled for late April 2014.
The contract between Roscosmos and Arianspace on Soyuz project for Kourou was signed in 2005. It was planned to launch about 50 Russian Soyuz-ST boosters from Kourou spaceport within 15 years.
Since 2011 and up to the present time 6 Soyuz boosters have been launched from Kourou. 4 launches were planned for 2014. The first of them will take place on April 4, Soyuz-ST will orbit European Earth remote sensing satellite Sentinel-1A.
