Russia has successfully launched a Soyuz-2.1b rocket carrying a military-related spacecraft from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Arkhangelsk Region, the Defense Ministry has said.
In a statement on Saturday, the ministry said the rocket’s launch and the spacecraft’s deployment proceeded without issues, adding that “at the designated time, the spacecraft was placed into its target orbit and taken under control by ground-based Space Forces systems,” and that its onboard systems were operating normally.
The launch produced a striking “space jellyfish” phenomenon over the neighboring Komi Republic, where residents filmed a bright plume spreading into translucent streaks across the night sky. The effect commonly appears around first-stage burnout, stage separation, and second-stage ignition, when high-altitude exhaust is illuminated by sunlight while observers on the ground are already in darkness.
While the Defense Ministry did not identify the spacecraft or disclose its mission, the Soyuz-2.1b medium-lift rocket is often used to carry GLONASS navigation satellites, Liana electronic reconnaissance satellites, and Tundra ballistic missile early-warning systems.
Earlier this year, Plesetsk faced an attempted Ukrainian drone raid, with Roscosmos chief Dmitry Bakanov saying that Kiev had unsuccessfully tried to disrupt a March launch of Russian broadband satellites.
That March launch placed the first 16 satellites of Russia’s Rassvet constellation into orbit. Developed by the private company Bureau 1440 and often dubbed ‘Russia’s Starlink,’ they function as 5G base stations and can be used for drone controls with a high resistance to electronic warfare.
Ukrainian military intelligence has sounded the alarm over Rassvet, claiming that Russia is already using the network for military communications over Ukraine, although coverage remains intermittent. Bureau 1440 said it plans to grow the constellation to more than 900 satellites by 2035.
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