Kondor,

GRAU index The Main Missile and Artillery Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation (), commonly referred to by its transliterated Russian acronym GRAU (), is a department of the Russian Ministry of Defense. It is subordinate to the ...

14F133, is a series of Earth imaging or military reconnaissance satellites developed by

NPO Mashinostroyeniya NPO Mashinostroyeniya (russian: НПО машиностроения, lit=RDA of machine manufacturing) is a rocket design bureau based in Reutov, Russia. During the Cold War it was responsible for several major weapons systems, including the UR- ...

for the

Russian Aerospace Defence Forces The Russian Aerospace Defence Forces (VVKO) ( rus, Войска воздушно-космической обороны (ВВКО), Voyska vozdushno-kosmicheskoy oborony (VVKO)) was a branch of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation respons ...

which in 2015 became the

Russian Space Forces The Russian Space Forces ( rus, Космические войска России, Kosmicheskie voyska Rossii, KV) are a branch of the Russian Aerospace Forces, that provides aerospace warning, air and space sovereignty, and other related protect ...

and export customers. Satellites for the Russian military are designated "Kondor", whilst those for export are designated Kondor-E. Kondor satellites are equipped to carry either

synthetic aperture radar Synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) is a form of radar that is used to create two-dimensional images or three-dimensional reconstructions of objects, such as landscapes. SAR uses the motion of the radar antenna over a target region to provide fine ...

electro-optical Electro–optics is a branch of electrical engineering, electronic engineering, materials science, and material physics involving components, electronic devices such as lasers, laser diodes, LEDs, waveguides, etc. which operate by the propag ...

imaging payloads, with the first satellite, and are launched using the Strela carrier rocket, developed by NPO Mashinostroyeniya from retired

UR-100 The UR-100 (russian: УР-100) was an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) developed and deployed by the Soviet Union from 1966 to 1996. UR () in its designation stood for Universal Rocket (russian: links=no, Универсальная Р� ...

NUTTKh missiles. A

mass simulator A boilerplate spacecraft, also known as a mass simulator, is a nonfunctional craft or payload that is used to test various configurations and basic size, load, and handling characteristics of rocket launch vehicles. It is far less expensive t ...

named Gruzomaket (aka Kondor-E-GVM, COSPAR 2003-055A ) was launched on 5 December 2003, and almost ten years later on 27 June 2013, the first spacecraft was launched. Kondor No.202 (aka Kosmos 2487, Kondor 1, COSPAR 2013-032A) was operated by the

Russian military The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (, ), commonly referred to as the Russian Armed Forces, are the military forces of Russia. In terms of active-duty personnel, they are the world's fifth-largest military force, with at least two m ...

, and carried a radar imaging payload. It was the first radar imaging satellite to be operated by the Russian military after the Soviet

RORSAT Upravlyaemy Sputnik Aktivnyy (russian: Управляемый Спутник Активный for Controlled Active Satellite), or US-A, also known in the west as Radar Ocean Reconnaissance Satellite or RORSAT (GRAU index 17F16K), was a series of ...

and

Almaz The Almaz (russian: Алмаз, lit=Diamond) program was a highly secret Soviet military space station program, begun in the early 1960s. Three crewed military reconnaissance stations were launched between 1973 and 1976: Salyut 2, Salyut 3 a ...

-T series. The first Kondor-E (Kondor-E 1, COSPAR 2014-084A) launched 19 December 2014 for

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. Civilian versions of the satellite have been designed under the name Kondor-FKA or Kondor-FKA-M. As of March 2023 the launches of the first two of them, Kondor-FKA №1 and №2, are planned for June 2023 and 2024 respectively.

References

Reconnaissance satellites of Russia Space synthetic aperture radar NPO Mashinostroyeniya products {{Russia-spacecraft-stub