The first private spaceport will be built in Russia

The Nizhny Novgorod Region and the Republic of Tatarstan are considered to be a place for the cosmodrome, Izvestia writes . The platform will be used for suborbital launches to an altitude of about 200 km. Since lightweight rockets do not require a large exclusion zone around the launch site, it is possible to build in densely populated areas in Central Russia. So say businessmen from Skolkovo, who got the idea to make money on space tourism.

The construction was announced by CosmoCourse LLC (Skolkovo resident). The cosmodrome on the 2.5 × 2 km section will be equipped with one launch pad with two non-buried launch tables - the main and the backup, made under a simplified scheme (without robotized elements), as well as service towers that provide people access to the rocket. More on the territory of the complex will house a system for refueling and storage of fuel, transport and installation unit and some other elements. Project cost - $ 40 million.

The central object of the cosmodrome is a large technical complex for final rocket assembly, testing and inter-flight maintenance. The lion’s share of the complex will be taken by a flat circular platform for landing descending capsules with a radius of about 2 km.
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The CosmoCourse Company was founded in 2014 as part of the Skolkovo Foundation. The main activity is space tourism. CEO - Pavel Pushkin. The latter assures that the main investor allocated the money for the construction of the cosmodrome;

In addition to the cosmodrome, CosmoCourse is developing a reusable suborbital space complex for tourist flights into space (MSC). It consists of a reusable suborbital launch vehicle (MCPH) and a reusable suborbital spacecraft (MSKA).

The space tourist will be offered a flight lasting 15 minutes as part of a group of six sightseers, in which each tourist can stay in a state of weightlessness for 5-6 minutes, moving freely inside the cabin with a total volume of 30 m ³ and having the opportunity to look at Earth from space personal porthole.


As reported on the official website, the peculiarity of the flight sequence is the strictly vertical active section of MSCA with the help of MCPN. After separation, MSKA and MSRN continue flight by inertia. MSCA makes ballistic descent and landing using parachute and jet systems. MSRN makes descent and landing with the help of the mid-flight propulsion system and the propulsion system of orientation and stabilization.

The use of additional operations when returning from space "allows us to ensure the full reusability of the complex and at the same time implements a reliable and safe flight pattern with a multi-level response to emergency situations and a concomitant reduction in the requirements for the health of potential tourists." Parry of possible emergency situations is provided at all stages of the flight due to:

• use in the composition of the propulsion systems of the emergency rescue system (SAS) with liquid rocket engines (LRE) as part of MSKA;
  
• hot backup in case of failure of one or more single rocket engine (depending on the position of the time interval of the accident moment on the cyclogram of flight);
  
• use of a parachute-jet landing system, ensuring guaranteed safe landing of MSCA at relatively low speeds even in the event of a parachute or jet system failure (rigid landing pattern);
  
• the presence in the MSKA of a shock-absorbing system, the analogue of which is the shock seat of the cosmonaut Kazbek-UM.

This approach allows you to create a new product with fundamentally new qualities, businessmen say. At the same time, the space flight service is implemented with the following parameters:

• Crew: 6 tourists + instructor.
  
• Ticket price: $ 200-250 thousand.
  
• The height of the flight: 180-220 km.
  
• Time in zero gravity: 5−6 minutes.
  
• Flight time: 15 minutes.
  
• First flight: 2025 year.

Initially, it was planned to launch from the Kapustin Yar or Baikonur, but now the company decided to build its own: “The Baikonur cosmodrome is far from the central part of the country and has the infrastructure for medium and heavy launch vehicles, which is not suitable for the implementation of our project,” said Company Pavel Pushkin. - If we talk about the Vostochny cosmodrome, then there are no convenient fields for landing. Therefore, we have designed our own site exclusively for suborbital launches. ”

According to Pushkin, in the future, the spaceport can also be used for other projects: tests of space technology and rocket-model competitions. He says that in the USA there are more than ten private cosmodromes of various levels, therefore the appearance of such a cosmodrome in Russia stimulates the development of new industries. The founder of the Lin Industrial project, Alexander Ilyin, agrees that the testing platform would be useful to many private rocket builders.

If you choose a suitable site, then construction will begin in 2022.