OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE
about a meeting of the Council of Chief Designers
on the preliminary design of the upper stage Block DM-SL B
and Ascent Unit of the Land Launch space launcher system.

Korolev, Moscow region. On January 15, 2003, S.P.Korolev Rocket and Space Corporation Energia hosted
a meeting of the Council of Chief Designers chaired by the S.P.Korolev RSC
Energia Designer General, a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences,
Yu.P.Semenov, which reviewed preliminary designs for upper stage DM-SL B and
the Ascent Unit with this upper stage within the Land Launch space launcher
system.

The Land Launch system is being developed to performance specifications from
the Russian Aviation and Space Agency, and is based on the earlier design
experience and production capacities of Russian and Ukrainian rocket and
space companies from the Sea Launch project, including the Zenit-3 SL launch
vehicle (LV) with upper stage DM-SL.It is planned to base the system at the
Baikonur launch site, where an infrastructure is available to support
activities on spacecraft, DM-type upper stages, and Zenit-type LV.
The Council of Chief Designers reviewed and approved the presented
preliminary designs, noting that the proposed upper stage engineering
solutions are aimed at improving its mass, performance and operational
properties, and that flight tests of the Land Launch system can be started
as early as mid-2004, provided all the required ground infrastructure work
is complete.

Participating in the work of the Council of Chief Designers were the
Rosaviacosmos Deputy Director General A.N.Kuznetsov, managers and
representatives of the companies participating in the Land Launch project.
This project is being implemented in coordination with the international
company Sea Launch as an additional option for the spacecraft launch
services that are being provided.

The Council of Chief Designers was presented with the findings of the
commission headed by a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
A.S.Koroteev that was set up to analyze the failure of the upper stage Block
DM3 during launch of Astra-1K spacecraft on November 26, 2002.
Note was taken of the fact that the failure was caused by a burn-through in
the line at the exit from the main engine gas generator, caused by an excess
of fuel in the gas generator, and that this failure is an isolated case that
does not affect the achieved reliability of the engine and the upper stage
as a whole.

The Council reviewed the recommendations of the commission on the upper
stage pre-launch processing and the results of their implementation on the
next upper stage, which, on December 25, 2002, successfully put into the
working orbit the spacecraft of the Russian Global Navigation Satellite
System Glonass.