MOSCOW, November 15 The second Arktika-M satellite, necessary, among other things, for monitoring the Northern Sea Route , will be launched into orbit from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on December 16, a source in the rocket and space industry said.
The day before, Roscosmos reported that the device was delivered by rail from NPO Lavochkin in Khimki near Moscow to Baikonur on November 14, and its launch is planned for December.
“According to the preliminary plan, the launch of the Soyuz-2.1b rocket with the Fregat upper stage and the Arktika-M satellite No. 2 is planned at 12.17 Moscow time on December 16, 2023,” the agency’s interlocutor said.
Arktika-M satellites operate in a highly elliptical orbit, which allows them to explore the Arctic region. The two spacecraft will provide round-the-clock monitoring of the Earth's surface and clouds, as well as the seas in the Arctic.
In the future it is planned to increase the number of devices in the system to four. As former head of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Sergeev said, this will make it possible to monitor the Arctic every 15 minutes with good spatial and temporal resolution and receive up to two million images per year. It is planned that two more satellites will appear in the system by 2031.
In addition, in 2026 the design of the new generation Arktika-MP devices will begin. It is expected that, due to a larger number of spectral channels, they will be able to obtain images with better spatial resolution and provide qualitatively new information about the high-latitude Arctic regions of the planet.
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