MOSCOW, 25 APR – RIA Novosti. Specialists of NPO Lavochkin (the enterprise of the Russian space Agency), which were temporarily closed due to coronavirus in Kourou, returned from French Guiana to Russia, said the Russian space Agency.
“a Group of specialists of NPO Lavochkin of nine persons at the launch site the Guiana space center (French Guiana) to conduct critical routine operations with the upper stage “Fregat-MT”, finished the necessary work, and on April 24 took off from the airport Cayenne in Moscow with a stopover in Paris. Today at 14.30 at Sheremetyevo airport landed the plane with Russian specialists”, – is spoken in the message on the website of the Corporation. It is noted that the arrived experts feel well and will be in isolation for two weeks because of the pandemic of coronavirus.
As explained by RIA Novosti in the press service of Roscosmos, the last Russian specialists will return from Kourou until the end of April. Earlier the General Director of the Center for exploitation of ground space infrastructure (the enterprise of the Russian space Agency) Andrey Ohlopkov has informed that it will occur April 27-30.
In mid-March, the company Arianespace announced that the preparations for the rocket launches from the Kourou launch pad, including the Russian Soyuz, which was suspended due to the spread of the coronavirus. On the 14th of April from Kourou was scheduled launch of “Soyuz” with the satellite UAE Falcon Eye-2, the second half of may French unit CSO-2. Both the launch had previously been delayed by a month due to problems with the upper stage “Fregat”.
In early April, the RIA Novosti source in the rocket and space industry reported that on September 15 planned launch of Falcon Eye-2, on October 15, device CSO 2, on December 15 – two European Galileo navigation satellites. Later transfer runs for September confirmed the General Director of the Russian space Agency, Dmitry Rogozin.
From October 2011 from Kourou done 23 launch of Russian rocket “Soyuz”. One of the launches in August 2014 ended the breeding of European Galileo navigation satellites into an unplanned orbit due to the accident of the booster “Frigate”.
