Speaking at the MAKS air show in Zhukovsky, outside Moscow, Maxim Gonchar said the Land Launch program, based on collaboration between the Sea Launch Company, Space International Services (SIS), and the Russian Federal Space Agency, would allow up to five launches of Zenit. At least five orders for launches through this system are expected to be placed annually, he said.
Gonchar also said that an agreement for the first commercial Land Launch mission had already been signed with PanAmSat, a company providing global video and broadcasting services via satellite. Under the contract, a Zenit-3SLB vehicle will lift the PAS-11 communications satellite to geosynchronous transfer orbit from Baikonur by the end of the second quarter of 2007.
