A Soyuz 2-1b/Fregat was launched from Vostochny launch site in Far Eastern Russia on 26 June 2023. Aboard was the VNIIEM-built 3.25 metric ton Meteor M2-3, a phased-arraw radar-equipped weather satellite heading for a 800 km sun-synchronous low Earth orbit, as the main satellite payload of the launch. However, also aboard the rocket were in fact 42 other mainly cubesat-class satellites aboard including eight SITRO-AIS ship tracking satellites, 16 Space-Pi CubeSats and a 12U cubesat called Space-PHI demo. These were deployed into a lower 570 km orbit.
Soyuz 2-1b/Fregat is launched on 27 June 2023 with 43 satellites aboard. Courtesy: Roscosmos via RussianSpaceWeb
