In accordance with the decision of the State Commission this morning, February 3, 2020, the “Soyuz-2.1b” launch vehicle with the “Fregat-M” upper stage and OneWeb British communications satellites was rolled out from the Assembly and Testing building and installed at the launch pad № 31 of the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
After the installation of the rocket in the launcher and verticalization, service masts were reduced to it.
Then, the team of the enterprises of the Russian rocket and space industry began to perform operations according to the schedule of the first launch day: autonomous tests of systems and units of the payload, launch vehicle and launch complex are carried out.
The launch of the “Soyuz-2.1b” launch vehicle with the “Fregat-M” upper stage and 34 OneWeb satellites is scheduled for February 7, 2020 at 00:42:41 (Moscow time).
The separation of the upper stage from the third stage will take place 562 seconds after the launch.
Over the next 3.5 hours, in accordance with the flight schedule, the spacecrafts will be separated from the “Fregat-M” upper stage.
The first six OneWeb satellites were launched from the Guiana Space Center using the “Soyuz-ST-B” launch vehicle on February 28, 2019.
In total, the company intends to deploy about 600 satellites in low Earth orbit and begin their commercial use in 2020.
By 2021, OneWeb intends to provide 24-hour Earth coverage.
OneWeb low-orbit spacecrafts are designed to provide high-speed Internet directly via satellite.
