Space News by Caleb Henry — July 20, 2018
Russian President Vladimir Putin called on Roscosmos to meet deadlines for the nation’s future Angara, Soyuz-5 and “super-heavy class†rockets while fixing quality-control issues that have dogged Russian spacecraft and launch vehicles in recent years.
According to the Kremlin’s published transcript of Putin’s remarks during a July 18 meeting with the state-run space corporation Roscosmos, Putin said it “is necessary to drastically improve the quality and reliability of space and launch vehicles†and to preserve Russia’s increasingly threatened leadership in space.
“[F]or all the known problems, the missile and space industry has powerful technological and personnel potential, great engineers and scientific schools … Since the space industry is strategically important, please focus on the key tasks at hand,†he said.
Russia’s Proton rocket has suffered more than half a dozen full or partial failures this decade, and was sidelined for much of 2016 and 2017 for an anomaly review and the subsequent unrelated discovery of incorrectly built engines. Proton’s launch troubles have caused International Launch Services, the U.S.-based commercial sales arm of rocket manufacturer Khrunichev, to lose business to European and American launch providers.
More:
https://spacenews.com/putin-challenges-roscosmos-to-drastically-improve-on-space-and-launch/
