Angara May be Ready to Go on July 9 – UPDATE

UPDATE, July 7, 2014:  Russia’s RIA Novosti news service reports today that Angara has been rolled back to the launch pad in preparation for a “preliminary” launch date of July 9.  No further details, such as launch time, are provided.

ORIGINAL STORY, July 5, 2014:  Russian news sources are saying that Russia may try again on July 9, 2014 for the first test launch of the Angara rocket.   No official announcement has yet appeared on the website of the rocket’s manufacturer, Khrunichev, or Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, however, so the date should be treated as tentative.

Just a few days ago, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said he would not be surprised if it took “weeks” before another attempt was made.  The first attempt on June 27 was scrubbed in the final minute or so of the countdown apparently due to a bad valve.  The rocket had to be rolled back from the launch pad to its assembly and test facility.

Today’s reports do not indicate what time on July 9 another attempt will be made.   This is a suborbital test flight carrying a dummy payload. The approximately 25 minute flight will terminate on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, a site often used as the termination point for missile tests.

The Angara1.2 PP flight is of the smallest version of Angara.  Under development since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Angara family of rockets — with versions of varying capability up to 25 tons to low Earth orbit — is eventually intended to replace most of the Soviet-era rockets including Soyuz and Proton.

Russia’s official Interfax and Itar-Tass news agencies carried the story of the new launch date today; Itar-Tass was quoting another Russian newspaper, Kommersant.