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History of Dombarovskiy Red Banner Division (13th Division of RVSN) Dombarovskiy missile division is located in Southern Russia, southeast of the city of Orenburg and Orsk, and just north of the border with Kazakhstan near the town of Dombarovskiy.Its origin dates back to the beginning of the 1960s, when the Soviet military launched a search for potential sites of operational deployment of the intercontinental ballistic missiles, ICBMs. The mass construction of the missile launch infrastructure was taking place in mid 1960s, becoming a major burden for the Soviet economy. The missile division at Dombarovskiy was officially formed in 1964 (in February 1965, according to other sources) with Major General Dmitry Chaplygin as its first commander. The site was intended for underground silos, housing heavy ICBMs. As many as 10 units of the Soviet Strategic Missile Forces manned from 6 to 10 OS-type operational silos each. At the peak of the operations at the Dombarovskiy site, total 64 silos were reportedly on alert. According to the Russian press, in 2004, the regiment maintained 52 launchers. As of 2002, Dombarovskiy was one of 18 operational missile divisions within the Russian strategic missile forces. The missiles of the R-36 and R-36M family were deployed in the area. Dombarovskiy missile deployment history:
Geography of the site In mid-2006, Google Earth application provided very high-resolution imagery of large portions of the former Soviet Union, essentially putting spy-satellite data on the desktop of general public. Although only fragments of the Dombarovskiy region were available at one-meter resolution, numerous silos could be easily discerned spreading from Dombarovskiy region northeast toward Lake Zhetykol. Most sites featured a single silo, surrounded by multiple layers of barbwire fences and connected by hard-surface roads with wide radius turns to the main area on the west side of the town of Yasniy -- a home of the division's headquarters. Satellite photos of the military base in Yasniy showed what appeared to be a large storage area, military barracks, a launch silo -- possibly used for training purposes -- and a railway station, where missiles and their warheads are unloaded from trains and transferred to large tracks for transportation to remote silos. A railway line connected the base with the spur branching out from the Svetliy - Orsk - Orenburg line, which links the site with the rest of Russia. Other military installations in the area included a military airfield just north of Dombarovskiy and the antiaircraft site in Krasnochabanskiy, southeast of Orsk. The site looked long abandoned at the turn of the 21st century. Post-Soviet period: space missions In mid-2000s, the Russian government conducted a number of upgrades at the Dombarovskiy site, in the effort to transfer here commercial space launches of the Dnepr booster from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. According to Gazeta.ru, the launches from Dombarovskiy could head in southern direction to reach orbits with the inclination 95 degrees, with the first stage of the Dnepr falling in Turkmenistan and the second stage in the Indian Ocean. At the same time the launches in eastern direction would enable delivering payloads into the orbit with the inclination 65 degrees, and the first stage drop zone in Tyumen Region and the second stage in the Pacific Ocean. As of 2004, the plans of military training of the Russian Strategic Missile Forces included as many as seven launches from Dombarovskiy site, using decomissioned missiles and delivering commercial payloads. Russia fires missile from operational base Published: 2004 Dec. 22 Russian Strategic Missile Forces, RVSN, launched its largest Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, ICBM from an operational base in the south of the country. The R-36M-2 Voevoda missile, capable of carrying 10 warheads, blasted off from a silo facility of the 13th missile regiment deployed near the town of Dombarovka in Orenburg Region at the border with Kazakhstan at 11:30 Moscow Time on Wednesday, December 22, 2004. The missile headed in eastern direction toward the Kura impact site in the Kamchatka Peninsula. The Russian government reportedly allocated a slot of uninhabited marshy land in the Vagai, Vikulov and Sorokin Districts of the Tyumen Region as the impact site for the first stage of the missile. Colonel General Nikolai Solovtsov, the commander of the RVSN, personally attended the test. The R-36M-2 Voevoda is the most advanced missile in the R-36M family. As a number of previous launches, the latest mission was intended to certify the R-36M-2 missile for extended period of operational service, currently reaching 20 years. At the same time, the decision of the Russian government to move such launches from a test site in Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, to an operational base aims to validate the use of such facility for commercial space launches, beginning in 2005. As many as six orbital launches, of the converted R-36M ICBM designated Dnepr could earn estimated $40 million for the cash-strapped branch of the Russian Armed Forces. Kosmotras joint venture, marketing Dnepr to commercial customers, hopes to use the launch facility near Dombarovka for launches in southern direction to reach polar orbits. Russia inaugurates new space launch site Published: 2006 July 17 A converted ballistic missile orbited a commercial payload, using an operational ICBM base as its launch site for the first time. The Dnepr rocket, based on the R-36M UTTKh missile, lifted off from Dombarovskiy base in southern Russia on July 12, 2006, at 18:53 Moscow Time. It carried the Genesis Pathfinder-1 experimental payload for the US-based Bigelow Aerospace. The launch vehicle successfully released its cargo into nearly circular orbit with the altitude of about 500 kilometers and the inclination of 64.51 degrees toward the Equator. At 19:08 Moscow Time the control over the spacecraft was transferred to Bigelow, Roskosmos said. According to Bigelow Aerospace, the satellite aims to test inflatable structures, which the company claims could be used for the assembly of orbital hotels. In the meantime, back on Earth, Dombarovskiy provided Moscow-based Kosmotras, which markets Dnepr to commercial customers, with an alternative launch site on the Russian soil to the Baikonur Cosmodrome located several hundreds kilometers to the south in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan. The launch was previously scheduled for April, June 13 and June 16, 2006. Environmental concerns In the wake of the Dnepr rocket failure in July 2006, the administration of the Orenburg Region sought to ban similar launches from the facilities around Dombarovskiy, Gazeta.ru reported. At the request of representatives of the region's legislative assembly, vice-governor of the Orenburg Region Sergei Grachev promised that no further launches from the site would take place, until the assessment of the environmental impact on the area had been conducted. At the same time, Russian officials questioned whether Orenburg had a jurisdiction to ban launches from the region. Russia fires R-36M-2 from Dombarovskiy 2006 Dec. 21, 11:20 Moscow Time (8:20 GMT): Russian Strategic Missile Forces, RVSN, launched the R-36M-2 missile from Dombarovskiy. A spokesman for the Russian Strategic Missile Forces, RVSN, said that the vehicle successfully reached its target on the Kamchatka Peninsula. |
Cutaway view of the silo launch complex for the R-36M ICBM. Credit: KB Yuzhnoe
A booster stage of the R-36M missile is being loaded into its silo in Baikonur. Credit: Kosmotras
A warhead section of the R-36M missile is being loaded into its silo in Baikonur. Credit: Kosmotras
Copyright: � 2005 Seiji Yoshimoto
A hotel in the Dombarovskiy area, which housed western contractors working on upgrades to the facility for commercial launches around 2004 and 2005. Click to enlarge Copyright: � 2005 Seiji Yoshimoto |
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