NPO Lavochkin (russian: НПО Лавочкина, OKB-301, also called Lavochkin Research and Production Association or shortly Lavochkin Association, LA) is a Russian aerospace company. It is a major player in the Russian space program, being the developer and manufacturer of the Fregat upper stage, as well as interplanetary probes such as Fobos-Grunt. As of 2015, it was headed by Sergei Lemeshevskii. On August 10, 2017 the Lavochkin Association's Board of Directors appointed Vladimir Kolmykov Director General of the enterprise.
Overview
The company develops and manufactures spacecraft such as the Fregat rocket upper stages, satellites and interplanetary probes. It is a contractor for a number of military programs, such as the
Oko
OKO ( rus, ОКО, r=, literally means eye, also an abbreviation for Ob'yedinonnyye Kristallom Osnovaniya ( rus, Oбъединённые Кристаллом Oснования, r=, literally means Foundations Bound by a Crystal)) is a complex o ...
early warning satellite
An early warning satellite is a satellite designed to rapidly detect ballistic missile launches and thus enable defensive military action. To do this, these satellites use infrared detectors that identify the missile thanks to the heat given off ...
, Prognoz and Araks programmes as well as the civilian program Kupon. One of the company's most notable projects was the participation in the failed Fobos-Gruntsample return mission. NPO Lavochkin has also developed the Elektro–L series of new-generation weather satellites, as well as the Navigator standardised satellite platform, which will serve as the basis for several future Russian satellites.
History
The company was founded in 1937 as OKB-301, a
Soviet
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
aircraft design bureau (OKB). The head designer was , supported by and Semyon Lavochkin. On October, 1945 Lavochkin was promoted for the head designer of the design bureau. It gained distinction for its family of piston-engined fighter aircraft during World War II, and later shifted to missile and jet fighter designs. Following the death of the head designer, the OKB-301 succumbed to the growing power of Vladimir Chelomey and became OKB-52 Branch No. 3 on 18 December 1962. Later, it turned to work on interplanetary probe designs for Luna sample return program, the Lunokhod program, Vega program, Phobos program, etc. The former OKB-301 became named NPO Lavochkin.
In January 2012, officials of Lavochkin faced administrative punishment for not taking into account of designing the computer system after the crash of Russia's Mars moon spacecraft Fobos-Grunt.
Projects
Aircraft
*
LaGG-1
The Lavochkin-Gorbunov-Gudkov LaGG-1 (russian: Лавочкин-Горбунов-Гудков ЛаГГ-1) was a Soviet fighter aircraft of World War II. Although not very successful, it formed the basis for a series of aircraft that would eventual ...
La-200
The Lavochkin La-200 (a.k.a. Aircraft 200) was a two-seater, swept winged, night/all-weather jet interceptor designed and manufactured by the Soviet Union's Lavochkin Design Bureau from 1948.
Design and development
In response to a requirement ...
SAM
Sam, SAM or variants may refer to:
Places
* Sam, Benin
* Sam, Boulkiemdé, Burkina Faso
* Sam, Bourzanga, Burkina Faso
* Sam, Kongoussi, Burkina Faso
* Sam, Iran
* Sam, Teton County, Idaho, United States, a populated place
People and fictional ...
for S-25 air defense system
* La-350 Burya - intercontinental cruise missile
* La-400 DAL - surface to air missile
* Fregat - upper stage
Spacecraft
*
Astron Astron may refer to:
* Mitsubishi Astron engine
* ASTRON, the Dutch foundation for astronomy research, operating the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope and LOFAR
* Astron (comics), a fictional character, a member of the Marvel Comics group The Et ...
Elektro-L No.1
Elektro-L No.1 (russian: Электро-L), also known as Geostationary Operational Meteorological Satellite No.2 or GOMS No.2, is a Russian geostationary weather satellite which was launched in 2011. The first Elektro-L spacecraft to fly, it beca ...
**
Elektro-L No.2
Elektro-L No.2 is a Russian geostationary weather satellite which launched on 11 December 2015.
It is the second Elektro-L spacecraft to fly, after Elektro-L No.1 launched in 2011. The Elektro-L No. 2 satellite system was developed by Lavockh ...
Granat
The International Astrophysical Observatory "GRANAT" (usually known as Granat; russian: Гранат, lit. ''pomegranate''), was a Soviet (later Russian) space observatory developed in collaboration with France, Denmark and Bulgaria. It was launc ...
Luna 12
Luna 12 (E-6LF series) was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program, also called Lunik 12.
Overview
Luna 12 was launched towards the Moon from an Earth-orbiting platform and achieved lunar orbit on October 25, 1966. The spacecraft was equipp ...
**
Luna 13
Luna 13 (E-6M series) was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program.
Overview
The Luna 13 spacecraft was launched toward the Moon from an Earth-orbiting platform and accomplished a soft landing on 24 December 1966, in the region of Oceanus P ...
**
Luna 14
Luna 14 (E-6LS series) was an uncrewed spacecraft, uncrewed space mission of the Luna program run by the Soviet Union. It was also called Lunik 14.
Overview
The spacecraft is believed to have been similar to Luna 12 and the instrumentation was si ...
Luna 17
''LOK Luna 17'' (Ye-8 series) was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program, also called ''Lunik 17''. It deployed the first robotic rover onto the surface of the Moon.
Launch
''Luna 17'' was launched from an Earth parking orbit towards ...
**
Luna 18
''Luna 18'', part of the Ye-8-5 series, was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program.
Overview
''Luna 18'' was placed in an Earth parking orbit after it was launched and was then sent towards the Moon. On 7 September 1971, it entered lunar ...
**
Luna 19
''Luna 19'' (a.k.a. ''Lunik 19'') (E-8-LS series), was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program. ''Luna 19'' extended the systematic study of lunar gravitational fields and location of mascons (mass concentrations). It also studied the lun ...
Luna 23
''Luna 23'' was an unmanned space mission of the Luna program developed by the Soviet Union.
Overview
''Luna 23'' was a Soviet Moon lander mission which was intended to return a lunar sample to Earth. Launched to the Moon by a Proton-K/ D, the ...
**
Luna 24
''Luna 24'' was a robotic probe of the Soviet Union's Luna programme. The last of the Luna series of spacecraft, the mission of the ''Luna 24'' probe was the third Soviet mission to return lunar soil samples from the Moon (the first two sampl ...
Luna E-8-5 No.402
Luna E-8-5 No.402, also known as Luna Ye-8-5 No.402, and sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1969C, was a Soviet Union, Soviet spacecraft under Luna programme which was lost in a launch failure in 1969. It was a Luna E-8-5 spacecraft, the first o ...
**
Luna E-8-5 No.405
Luna E-8-5 No.405, also known as Luna Ye-8-5 No.405, and sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1970A, was a Soviet spacecraft which was lost in a launch failure in 1970. It was a Luna E-8-5 spacecraft, the fifth of eight to be launched. It was int ...
**
Luna E-8-5M No.412
Luna E-8-5M No.412, also known as Luna Ye-8-5M No.412, and sometimes identified by NASA as Luna 1975A, was a Soviet spacecraft which was lost in a launch failure in 1975. It was a Luna E-8-5M spacecraft, the second of three to be launched. It ...
Mars program
The Mars program was a series of uncrewed spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1973. The spacecraft were intended to explore Mars, and included flyby probes, landers and orbiters.
Early Mars spacecraft were small, and launch ...
**
Mars 2M No.521
Mars 2M No.521, also known as Mars M-69 No.521 and sometimes identified by NASA as Mars 1969A, was a Soviet spacecraft which was lost in a launch failure in 1969. It consisted of an orbiter. The spacecraft was intended to image the surface of Mar ...
**
Mars 2M No.522
Mars 2M No.522, also known as Mars M-69 No.522 and sometimes identified by NASA as Mars 1969B, was a Soviet spacecraft which was lost in a launch failure in 1969. It consisted of an orbiter. The spacecraft was intended to image the surface of Mar ...
Mars 5
Mars 5 (), also known as 3MS No.53S was a Soviet spacecraft launched to explore Mars. A 3MS spacecraft launched as part of the Mars programme, it successfully entered orbit around Mars in 1974. However, it failed a few weeks later.
Spacecraft
T ...
**
Mars 5M Mars 5M, also known as Mars 79 (russian: Марс-5М, or ) was a cancelled Mars sample return mission that the Soviet Union was planning in the 1970s.
History
Mars 5M grew out of the Mars 5NM and Mars 4NM missions that were canceled along with ...
Mars-96
Mars 96 (sometimes called Mars-8) was a failed Mars mission launched in 1996 to investigate Mars by the Russian Space Forces and not directly related to the Soviet Mars probe program of the same name. After failure of the second fourth-stage bu ...
*
Oko
OKO ( rus, ОКО, r=, literally means eye, also an abbreviation for Ob'yedinonnyye Kristallom Osnovaniya ( rus, Oбъединённые Кристаллом Oснования, r=, literally means Foundations Bound by a Crystal)) is a complex o ...
- missile early warning satellite.
* Spektr-R - space
radio telescope
A radio telescope is a specialized antenna and radio receiver used to detect radio waves from astronomical radio sources in the sky. Radio telescopes are the main observing instrument used in radio astronomy, which studies the radio frequency ...
Spektr-RG
Spektr-RG (Russian: Спектр-РГ, ''Spectrum'' + '' Röntgen'' + ''Gamma''; also called Spectrum-X-Gamma, SRG, SXG) is a Russian–German high-energy astrophysics space observatory which was launched on 13 July 2019. It follows on from the ...
Vega 2
Vega 2 (along with Vega 1) was a Soviet space probe part of the Vega program to explore Halley's comet and Venus. The spacecraft was a development of the earlier ''Venera'' craft. The name VeGa (ВеГа) combines the first two letters Russian wo ...
Future projects
*
Luna-Glob
Luna-Glob (russian: Луна-Глоб, meaning ''Lunar sphere'') is a Moon exploration programme by Roscosmos meant to progress toward the creation of a fully robotic lunar base. When completed, the programme will continue with crewed lunar missi ...