On the night of March 6 to 7, 2021, from the Roscosmos North Cosmic Space Center (Samara, part of the “State Corporation” Roskosmos “) on the East Cosmodrome in the Amur region sent a railway composition with blocks of two launch vehicles” Union-2 “Stage 1b. These rockets are intended for launches of several batches of British spacecraft satellite company OneWeb.
Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket was created in the RCC “Progress” and is a modification of “Union-2”. Compared to the option “1a”, it has an engine with increased energy characteristics on the third stage. At the “Union-2.1b” in relation to the previous version above the accuracy of removal, stability and controllability, increased weight of the payload.
On the first and second stages of the carrier, liquid rocket engines of RD-107A and RD-108A are used, on the third – four-chamber RD-0124. With the help of RD-107 and RD-108, the development of the Scientific and Production Association “Energomash” named after Academician V.P. Glushko (included in Roscosmos) reliably ensures the implementation of the domestic program of manned flights and output of spacecraft. To date, work was carried out on the modernization of RD-107 basic engines for the first stage and RD-108 engines for the second stage – 18 modifications for various programs.