The Molniya were Soviet communication satellites operating from an inclined highly elliptical earth orbit of 500 km × 40000 km with 12 hour period for coverage of high northern latitudes.
The Molniya was a modification of the well-known R-7 Semyorka rocket and had four stages. The 8K78 resulted from a crash program by the Korolev Bureau to develop a booster for launching planetary probes. A larger third stage was added along with a fourth stage (Blok L) that was designed to fire in-orbit to send the payload out of LEO. The basic R-7 core was also structurally strengthened and given more powerful engines. A rushed development produced multiple malfunctions of the upper stages, which led to its being replaced by the improved Molniya-M in 1964, but there were enough 8K78s left to continue flying them into 1967.
The Strategic Rocket Forces of the Russian Federation are a separate-troops branch of the Russian Armed Forces that control Russia's land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).
WIKI18 Low Earth Orbit communication satellites with Ku, Q and V band payloads for the G60 constellation operated by Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technolo…
Chinese classified satellite claimed to be for communication technology test purposes. Actual mission not known.
Eighth test flight of the two-stage Starship launch vehicle.
The CSO-3 (Composante Spatiale Optique-3 satellite is the third of three new-generation high-resolution optical imaging satellites for the French mil…
A batch of 21 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
Glonass-K2 are the fourth generation of satellite design for GLONASS satellite navigation system. GLONASS is a Russian space-based navigation system …
Details TBD.
Progress resupply mission to the International Space Station.
Commercial Earth observation satellites (~540 kg each) built by CAST for China Siwei Survey and Mapping Technology Co. Ltd., with resolution down to …
A batch of 21 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.