Russia’s Dnepr rocket sets record with 32 satellite launches
21 Nov 2013
A Dnepr rocket set a record for the maximum number of satellite launches as it blasted off from Dombarovsky today. There were 32 satellites on board, including United Arab Emirates' DubaiSat-2, and Peru's first satellite. The rocket also had an attached payload. The mission also launched the smallest satellite ever, following lift off at 13:10:16 local time.
The Dnepr launch comes around thirty hours after an Orbital Sciences Minotaur I rocket placed 29 satellites and two attached payloads into orbit. The Minotaur I had broken a record, which had previously been held by the Dnepr since 2007.
Although today's launch carried more payloads than the Minotaur, the numbers that would be deployed directly would be less; twenty-three satellites were tasked with separating from the Dnepr itself, while the rest were sub-satellites to be deployed from other spacecraft on the mission.
The primary payload for today's launch was DubaiSat-2 for the Emirates Institution for Advanced Science and Technology, or EIAST.
The 300 kilogram (660 lb) satellite has been developed by South Korea's SATREC Initiative. It marks the first flight of the SI-300 satellite bus.
The satellite body is built in the shape of a hexagonal prism which carries cylindrical imager on top. The spacecraft is 1.50 metres in diameter and, including the imager, 1.95 metres in length.
The DubaiSat-2 earth-remote sensing satellite is the largest in the cluster and the STSat-3 astronomical satellite, which weighs 170 kilograms, is the second largest in the cluster.
Dnepr rockets are converted from RS-20 Voyevoda intercontinental ballistic missiles by the Kosmotras international space company, which operates the conversion programme. The company, which launches small satellites from Baikonur and from the Yasny launch site in Russia's Orenburg region, has so far carried out 17 successful Dnepr launches since 1999.
