25 reasons for pride: Vostochny Cosmodrome
On 7 May
2000, the first inauguration of Vladimir Putin as President of Russia took
place at the Grand Kremlin Palace. This date marked the beginning of an era in
which the country confidently asserted itself on the global stage and embarked
on large-scale internal transformations.
To mark the
25th anniversary of this event, the National Centre RUSSIA is launching a
special project titled "25 Reasons for Pride" — a chronicle of
achievements that are rightfully a source of national pride.
The first
reason for pride is the Vostochny Cosmodrome. It is the first civilian
cosmodrome built from scratch in modern Russia. Located in the Amur Region, it
lies almost 8,000 km from Moscow, making Vostochny one of the most remote
cosmodromes in the world.
The
cosmodrome has become one of the largest-scale projects in Russia in the 21st
century. Its construction — especially in the natural conditions of the Amur
region — is a complex engineering and technical challenge being tackled by the
country's top specialists.
As
thousands of people work at the cosmodrome, entire towns are being built for
them. In 2015, the town where the Vostochny staff live was renamed in honour of
the founder of astronautics, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky.
The most
important benefit the Russian space industry will gain once Vostochny is fully
operational is a modern, multipurpose cosmodrome located on national territory.
Vostochny is being constructed with the expectation that it will become the
main site for future launches. These launches will form the foundation for the
further development of Russia’s space fleet.
In addition
to being a launch platform, Vostochny is also a vast communications and control
hub, equipped with state-of-the-art systems for managing spacecraft operations.
The Vostochny command and tracking station enables control of Russian orbital
group spacecraft, the Russian segment of the ISS, and space vehicles.
