Start launcher

Element	Developer	Chief Designer	Location
Overall design	Moscow Teplotechics Institute (MIT)	Y. Solomonov	Moscow
Production	Votkinsk Plant	V. Tolmachev	Votkinsk, Udmurt Republic
Stages	NPO Soyuz	B. Zhukov	Lyubertsy (Moscow)

Start program developments:

1996 October: Akjuit Aerospace of Canada and NTTs Complex of Russia signed an agreement to launch Start boosters from a commercial spaceport in Northern Manitoba near Churchill, Manitoba. The construction of the "Spaceport Canada" was scheduled to start in the summer of 1997 and the first launch was expected in late 1998. Both Canadian and Russian government reportedly endorsed the project. (104)

Start launch log:

1993 March 25: A Start-1 launch vehicle lifted off from Plesetsk for the first time successfully delivering an experimental EKA-1 satellite.

1995 May 24: A Start launch vehicle failed to reach orbit after a liftoff from Plesetsk destroying the Russian EKA-2, an Israeli Gurwin (Techsat) and the Mexican Unamsat satellites.

1997 March 4, 05:00 local time (2 a.m. GMT): A Start-1 launch vehicle successfully delivered the 87-kilogram Zeya experimental satellite from Svobodny Cosmodrome into a Sun-synchronous orbit. The Zeya satellite was developed at NPO PM design bureau in cooperation with Mozhaisky Academy under a contract with the Russian space forces, VKS.

1997 Dec. 24: Start-1 placed EarlyBird satellite for the US company Earth Watch Inc, into sun-synchronous orbit after launch from Svobodny Cosmodrome in Western Siberia.

2000 Dec. 5: Start-1 booster successfully placed an Israeli-built EROS-A1 commercial imaging satellite into the sun-synchronous orbit after the launch from Svobodny Cosmodrome in Western Siberia.

2001 Feb. 20, 11:48:27 Moscow Time: Start-1 booster launched Odin research satellite from Svobodny Cosmodrome. The satellite separated from the fourth stage of the launch vehicle at 12:04:35 Moscow Time.

2006 April 25, 20:46 Moscow Summer Time (16:46 GMT): (planned time: 20:47:16) A converted ballistic missile delivered an Israeli remote-sensing satellite, after a blastoff from a launch site in the Russian Far East. The Start-1 launch vehicle, carrying the EROS-B1 satellite, blasted off from a mobile launcher deployed at the Svobodny.

The payload entered a nominal 508-kilometer circular polar orbit with the inclination 97.3 degrees toward the Equator approximately 16 minutes after the launch. The solar panels of the satellite had been successfully deployed some 30 seconds later.

The mission of the EROS-B1 received more attention from the media that those of its predecessor, in light of recent threats to Israel from the Iranian government. The world press emphasized that the Israeli government, as one of the major customer of the satellite's data, could use it to monitor Iranian military activities, including its nuclear and missile programs.

The launch was delayed from the fourth quarter of 2005 and March 21, 2005.

Text by Anatoly Zak; Last update: March 12, 2013