While “Space Cowboys” was a fictional film in the 1990s depicting veteran astronauts rounding up a rogue satellite, “Space Cowboys” might be a better description of the builders at Vostochny Cosmodrome. Already years late because of reported mismanagement and corruption, the new Russian spaceport, which is designed to launch both Soyuz and eventually Angara launch vehicles, has had yet another setback. The buildings are too small for the rockets.
The latest news is that plans to launch a Soyuz 2-1a launch vehicles are now on hold after the it was found that parts of the assembly buildings were designed for a different variant of the Soyuz and are too small for the Soyuz 2-1a planned for launch in December 2015.
Obviously, after such an embarrassing error, it was expected that those in charge would be fired as has previously happened in the Vostochny project. The only problem is, earlier this year Russian President Vladimir Putin declared himself as being in overall charge of the construction project. Mind you, the error was obviously made before his tenure.
