By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Russia will delay launches of military spacecraft this year because of a failed satellite launch last month, a top defence official said Tuesday.
The delays will be “insignificant”, Russian Space Forces Commander Lt. Gen. Oleg Ostapenko said.
Two telecommunications satellites were lost Aug 7 due to a failure in the Russian Proton-M rocket’s upper stage.
Ostapenko said the launches will be put on hold until the findings of a government probe into the incident are fully looked into, as the Briz-M upper stages are also used to hoist military spacecraft into orbit.
Several senior space officials have been sacked over the failure.
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