According to the chairman of the expert council of the center, the spacecraft will make it possible to survey the Earth's surface to monitor the ice situation, natural and man-made disasters, and determine the movement of ships on the territory of the NSR
MOSCOW, September 29. /TASS/. The Center for Space Technologies "Arcturus" of the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia will develop a spacecraft that allows remote sensing of the Earth's surface, as well as the surface covered with ice. One of the areas of application of the device will be the sounding of the territory of the Northern Sea Route (NSR), which will ensure the safety of navigation, adviser to the Governor of the Rostov region, Chairman of the expert Council of the center Anton Alekseev told TASS.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that in the coming years, traffic along the Northern Sea Route could become year-round. Within the framework of the Eastern Economic Forum (WEF), he also called for the opening of regular cargo flights on the NSR between Vladivostok and St. Petersburg from next year.
"The Arcoculus-01 project is dedicated to the development of a spacecraft with an onboard radar for remote sensing of the Earth. The aim of the project is to create a domestic system that allows solving the tasks of round-the-clock all-weather monitoring of the Northern Sea Route. <...> Round-the-clock all-weather monitoring of the ice situation in the waters of the Northern Sea Route is one of the critical tasks of ensuring navigation and, in general, the development of the Arctic region," he said, saying that the project will be implemented within three to four years.
According to Alekseev, the spacecraft will make it possible to survey the Earth's surface to monitor the ice situation, natural and man-made disasters, and determine the movement of ships on the territory of the NSR. Currently, the Arcturus Center has already completed the initial design stage of the Arcoculus-01 project, and has also prepared calculations of the main parameters of the small spacecraft, Alekseev said.
The Northern Sea Route is a shipping route, the main sea communication in the Russian Arctic. It runs along the northern shores of Russia along the seas of the Arctic Ocean and connects the European and Far Eastern ports of Russia, as well as the mouths of navigable Siberian rivers into a single transport system. The length of the route is 5.6 thousand km from the Kara Gate Strait to Providence Bay. The volume of traffic on the NSR is planned to increase to 100 million tons by 2030.