Russians declared their readiness to put into orbit the telecommunications satellite “Lybid”. The launch is intended to be carried out by using the launch vehicle “Zenith”.
According to Rano Juraeva, CEO at the Ground Space Infrastructure Center (TSENKI), quoted by the “Izvestia” edition, on December 11, the space vehicle “Elekro-L” will be launched from the launch site of the Baikonur. She also announced another further two launch missions of the rocket “Zenith”, which would put into space the space observatory “Spektr-RG” and the first Ukrainian communications satellite “Lybid”.
We shall recall that the Mediasat reported before that the satellite “Lybid” was stored in the Krasnoyarsk Territory on the premises of JSC “ISS-Reshetnev”.
According to “Izvestia”, the Russian party is actually waiting for Ukraine to pay for transporting the space vehicle from Zheleznogorsk to the Baikonur, as well as the component parts for the launch vehicle “Zenit”.
We should point out that the launch of “Lybid” has been repeatedly postponed over the past few years. Given exacerbation of relations between Ukraine and the Russian Federation, the space cooperation between the two countries was curtailed.
The satellite “Lybid” will have to operate in the orbital position 48°E. It is equipped with 24 transponders in Ku-band.
In early November of this year, the State Space Agency of Ukraine (SSAU) accused Canadians of delaying the launch process. Oleksandr Golub, the First Deputy Head of SSAU, stated that Ukraine fulfilled all its commitments, but the Canadian contractor “MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates” (MDA) did not meet its engagements due to financial troubles.
