The Angara space launch system family along with the
Rickshaw System is the new
generation of space boosters which Russia is proposing to develop. The Angara series of four next-generation boosters is Khrunichev
State Research and Production Center's response to the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program being developed in America.
The Angara family is intended to complement, and eventually to replace, the existing line of Rockot and Proton boosters. The Angara is being
developed to drastically lower the cost of launching payloads into orbits which is achieved by using common components across the models.
The vehicles will be flown from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome, using ground infrastructure built for Zenit rockets. Having a modern all-Russian
replacement is part of the impetus for Angara's development. Krunichev in cooperation with KB Salyut, the developer of the Buran orbiter,
designed a reusable flyback booster rocket called the "Baikal". The vehicle weighs 169 tons and is 44 meters tall with a maximum diameter
of 3.7 mtrs.
The Types of Launch Vehicles are:
- Light-Weight Launch Vehicle Angara A1.1 - Payload mass to LEO 2.0t. First stage is a common core booster (RD-191M Main Engine) with Breeze-KM upper stage and Rockot LV payload fairing.
- Light-Weight Launch Vehicle Angara A1.2 - Payload mass to LEO 3.7t. First stage is a common core booster with a newly developed second stage (RD-0124 Engine), the upper stage is a Breeze-KM with the Soyuz-2 LV payload fairing.
- Intermediate Launch Vehicle Angara A3 - Payload mass to LEO 14.1t and GEO to 1.1t. The first stage comprises of the core stage with 2 strap-on boosters with the newly developed second stage, the upper stage is a Breeze-M with Proton-M LV payload fairing.
- Heavy-Lift Launch Vehicle Angara A5 - Payload mass to LEO 24.5t and GEO to 4.0t. The first stage comprises of the core stage with 4 strap-on boosters with the newly developed second stage, the upper stage comprises of Breeze-M and KVRB with Proton-M LV payload fairing.
