Anatoly Kiselev, director general of the Khrunichev enterprise, builders of the Proton rocket and Zvezda components, expressed confidence that Proton will be able to catch up soon with its delayed flight manifest.
"We can fire three or even four Protons a month," Kiselev said.
Julie Andrews, the spokeswoman for International Launch Services (ILS) -- the joint venture between Khrunichev and Lockheed Martin -- echoed this opinion, saying that in the several years of their cooperation there was no serious schedule conflicts between Russian and Western payloads.
Kiselev agreed to outline Khrunichev's latest plans for the Proton launches:
- February 12: Indonesian Garuda communications satellite
- February 29: Russian Express A communications satellite
- March: Sirius communications satellite, earlier known as CD Radio
- April: Russian Gorizont communications satellite
- June: Russian Ekran communications satellite
- June: Russian Altair data relay and communications satellite to support the ISS
- June: Russian Zvezda service module for the ISS
Several other Proton payloads were identified for this year's launch manifest: The second Sirius communications satellite, a Sesat communications satellite and a cluster of three GLONASS navigation satellites.
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