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Soyuz launches second Ionosfera mission A Soyuz-2-1b rocket lifted off from Vostochny spaceport in July 2025, carrying the second pair of Ionosfera spacecraft, joining the first two satellites, launched in November 2024. The quartet was designed to monitor "space weather" phenomena, such as the impact of solar wind on the near-Earth space affecting civilian and military systems. The same rocket also delivered a cluster of secondary dual-use payloads, including a satellite for Iran. The Ionosfera-M3/4 mission at a glance:
The second Ionosfera mission The third and fourth Ionosfera-M satellites were intended for launch into an orbital plane that would be positioned perpendicular to the near-terminator orbit of the original duo, thus greatly expanding the three-dimensional coverage of the Earth's magnetosphere. In both pairs, individual satellites are distributed 180 degrees from each other in the phasing angle. The second pair of 430-kilogram satellites would also include for the first time the Ozonometr-TM instrument for measuring levels of ozone in the upper atmosphere. The 81KS payload fairing, used in the second Ionosfera mission, had markings from the European company Arianespace, indicating that it was recycled from an unused rocket which was originally intended to launch the 14th cluster of OneWeb satellites, but that mission was cancelled days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Secondary payloads
Payload arrangement for the second Ionosfera mission in July 2025: Ionosfera-M No. 3 and No 4 primary payloads are attached to side-facing interfaces (center) and the Iranian payload is placed at the top of the stack (right). Small containers for cubesats are also visible in top position and on the side of the payload attachment structure. The second pair of the Ionosfera-M satellites was integrated with the Fregat upper stage via an adapter that was identical to a structure flown in the first mission. As before, it was used to accommodate multiple secondary payloads, though a noticeably lower number than carried in the first Ionosfera launch. This time, the Fregat upper stage was programmed to deploy a total of 18 secondary payloads, including an Iranian satellite, which was mounted on top of the adapter. The other 17 payloads were small dual-use "cubesats" distributed between five launch containers provided by the Russian contractor Aerospeis Kapital:
The launch of secondary payloads was managed by the commercial arm of the Roskosmos State Corporation — AO Glavkosmos, which in the past had specialized in selling Russian space services to foreign customers. Secondary payloads aboard the Soyuz launch in July 2025:
Second Ionosfera launch campaign
As of October 2024, the second Ionosfera mission was expected to lift off in April 2025, but by the end of 2024, the mission was delayed until June 17, 2025. By March 2025, the launch was re-scheduled for July 25, 2025. The Fregat upper stage for the mission arrived at Vostochny around April 11, 2025. At the launch site, the space tug was put into storage until the start of the active launch campaign a month later. On May 12, 2025, Roskosmos reported that specialists from Vostochny space center and from NPO Lavochkin had unpacked Fregat and installed it into its processing rig for the upcoming electric and pneumatic tests preceding fueling operations. Roskosmos reported the start of fueling operations on Fregat on June 4, 2025. An Ilyshin-76 transport aircraft with a pair Ionosfera satellites for the mission landed at the newly completed airport in Vostochny on June 17, 2025. Specialists from VNIIEM Corporation, who built Ionosfera, were reported starting the tests of the spacecraft at the launch site on June 21. The assembly of the payload section for the mission started inside the spacecraft processing building, MIK KA, on July 15, 2025, and it was completed on July 18, followed by its rotation into horizontal position, for installation of the payload fairing assembly. The resulting composite was then transferred to the launch vehicle assembly building, MIK RN, where it was integrated with the third stage of the launch vehicle and, in turn, the resulting assembly was attached to the booster-stage cluster positioned on the transporter-erector, which was cleared for rollout operations on July 21, 2025. The Soyuz-2/Fregat rocket was transported to the 1S launch facility on the morning of July 22, 2025.
A Soyuz-2-1b rocket with a Fregat upper stage lifted off from the Soyuz launch complex in Vostochny on July 25, 2025, at 08:54:04.135 Moscow Time (14:54 local time, 05:54 UTC). After a few seconds of vertical ascent under the power of the four boosters of the first stage and the core booster of the second stage, the rocket headed northwest across eastern Russia, aligning its trajectory with a near-polar orbit inclined 98.57 degrees toward the Equator. The four strap-on boosters of the first stage separated 1 minute 59 seconds after liftoff in order to crash at Drop Zone No. 981 in the Amurskaya Oblast (Amur Region) on the border between the Tynda and Zeya Districts. The fairing protecting the payload then split in two halves and separate during the operation of the second stage at 3 minutes 47 seconds in flight. As a result, its fragments were to fall at Drop Zone No. 983 in the Aldan District in the Sakha (Yakut) Republic. Moments before the second stage completed its firing 4 minutes and 48 seconds into the flight, the RD-0124 engine of the third stage began to fire through the inter-stage lattice structure, which moments later separated along with the second stage 4 minutes and 48 seconds after liftoff. Just 1.5 seconds later, the tail section on the third stage split into three segments. Both, the second-stage booster and the segments of the tail section were expected to impact the ground at Drop Zone No. 985, in the Vilyusk District, located farther north in the Sakha Republic. The third stage continued firing, inserting the Fregat upper stage and its cargo into an orbit with an apogee (highest point) of around 196 kilometers and a perigee of just 12 kilometers or well in the dense atmosphere. As a result, after its engine cutoff and separation from Fregat, 9 minutes 24 seconds after liftoff, the third stage began a long free fall back to Earth over the Arctic and Northern Atlantic Oceans. Its trajectory was designed to bring the flaming debris of the booster crashing into the Atlantic Ocean. Space tug flight profile Following its split from the third stage at 09:03 Moscow Time on July 25, 2025, the Fregat was programmed to fire its engines over the Arctic Region 10 minutes 24 seconds after liftoff for around 1.5 minutes to ensure its insertion into a transfer orbit. The stack was expected to climb passively for around 46 minutes before Fregat had to fire for the second time near the apogee of its initial orbit, this time over the Antarctica, 56 minutes 2 seconds after liftoff. The maneuver, lasting less than a minute was designed to insert the vehicle into a nearly circular orbit around 820 kilometers above the Earth's surface. Around a minute later, at 09:56 Moscow Time, or 1 hour 2 minutes and 35 seconds after liftoff, the pair of Ionosfera satellites were programmed to eject from Fregat's payload adapter, completing the main task of the mission. Because the initial engine firings had to be performed by the Fregat beyond the view of Russian ground stations, their successful completion has to be confirmed during the subsequent passes of the vehicle over Russia. According to Roskosmos, the deployment of Ionosfera satellites went as scheduled. After the successful release of its primary payload, the Fregat was expected to embark on a pre-programmed sequence to deliver its secondary payloads into their orbits. Several hours after the launch, Aerospeis Kapital also reported that the telemetry from Fregat had confirmed opening of all five doors on its cubesat deployment containers and normal operation of all spring pushers designed to eject payloads, thus confirming the normal release of all 17 cubesats carried on the mission. According to the STTs center in St. Petersburg, the commands for the release of its four satellites were issue in following sequence:
The company reported that the first contact with all four satellites was made at 12:06 Moscow Time. The mission boosted the STTs orbital constellation to 13 satellites, the company said. The official Russian coverage of the mission and post-launch Russian announcements made no mention of the Iranian satellite carried during the flight. However, the Iranian Space Agency, ISA, announced that it had received first telemetry from the Nahid-2 satellite launched on Soyuz from Vostochny on July 25, 2025. According to the report, the 110-kilogram satellite, developed by several Iranian companies, was expected to operate in a 500-kilometer orbit. Following, the Nahid-2 satellite, the new spacecraft was expected to test Ku-band communications technologies for low-orbital and geostationary communications satellites and pave the way to the Nahid-3 spacecraft already in development at the time. After the release of all its passengers, the Fregat space tug was programmed to deorbit itself over the Pacific Ocean.
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