Roscosmos preparing another two Soyuz-5 launch vehicles - CEO

MOSCOW. May 18 (Interfax) - Roscosmos is preparing another two Soyuz-5 launch vehicles before transferring them to serial production, Roscosmos CEO Dmitry Bakanov said.

"We are preparing the second and third vehicles [Soyuz-5] after which serial production will begin," Bakanov said in an interview with Vesti.

The maiden Soyuz-5 launch was performed from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on April 30. Roscosmos said that the first and second stages performed as planned, and "a full-size mockup was launched into the target suborbital trajectory, and subsequently dropped into Pacific waters that were closed to ships and aircraft in advance."

Bakanov said after the launch that the Soyuz-5 LV would significantly reduce the unit cost of orbited payloads.

Soyuz-5 will be the first new launch vehicle developed in Russia since 2014, Bakanov said at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on April 11.

Energia Corporation is the lead designer of the medium-lift Soyuz-5. The rocket was developed as part of the Fenix R&D project. It is powered by the world's most powerful liquid-fuel rocket engine RD-171MV. The two-stage rocket will take off from the former Zenit launch site in Baikonur within a joint project with Kazakhstan. Soyuz-5 can bring up to 17 tonnes of payload to a reference orbit.

Baiterek, Russian-Kazakh launch site in Baikonur, will be supporting Soyuz-5 missions.