28 august 2010

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin unveils a plaque commemorating the start of construction of the Vostochny Cosmodrome

Participants:

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin continued his working visit to the Amur Region on August 28. He arrived in his Lada Kalina car at the site of a geological survey for the construction of the Vostochny Russian National Cosmodrome, where Mr Putin familiarised himself with the blueprints and layout of the future spaceport.

Anatoly Perminov, head of the Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos), told Mr Putin that two launch pads are planned for the spaceport, with appropriate infrastructure to prepare rockets for launch and assembly buildings. A special complex for training astronauts and medical examinations will also be built. Mr Perminov stressed the importance of building a runway.

Inspecting the boundaries of the future spaceport, Putin advised ensuring that there is extra land to avoid "any problems in the future." Anatoly Perminov said that the Vostochny Cosmodrome, equipped with modern technology, will occupy an area ten times smaller than the Baikonur Cosmodrome and three times smaller than the Plesetsk Cosmodrome.

Mr Putin noted that the spaceport should lay 150 km of railway lines and the same length of dirt roads. As for energy, the spaceport will have the largest energy supply among Russian cosmodromes due to the launch of the nearby Bureyskaya Hydropower Station.

Mr Putin unveiled a plaque commemorating the start of construction of the spaceport. The plaque is affixed to a large granite slab and reads: "A spaceport will be built here." Mr Putin personally removed the sheet covering the slab. Mr Putin touched the plaque and said: "Consider that the start!"