Dombarovsky (air base)

Dombarovsky (also given as Dombarovskiy and Tagilom) is a military airbase 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) northwest of the village of Dombarovsky, near Yasny in Russia's Orenburg Oblast. Operated by the Soviet Air Defence Forces and later by the Russian Air Force, it hosted fighter interceptor squadrons and hosts an ICBM base (which has been adapted for commercial satellite launches) with a supporting helicopter base.

Dombarovsky Yasnaya
Yasny, Orenburg Oblast in Russia
Dombarovsky Shown within Orenburg Oblast Show map of Orenburg Oblast Dombarovsky Dombarovsky (Russia) Show map of Russia
Coordinates	51°02′56″N 59°51′12″E
Type	Air Base
Site information
Owner	Ministry of Defence
Operator	Strategic Rocket Forces
Site history
In use	1953-present
Airfield information
Identifiers	ICAO: XWTD
Elevation	265 metres (869 ft) AMSL
Runways Direction Length and surface  Concrete
Helipads Number Length and surface 04/22 210 metres (689 ft) Concrete

The site is divided into three sites:

• The former main runway and dispersals: 51°05′35″N 59°50′45″E^[1]
• The current ICBM base: 50°48′12″N 59°30′59″E^[2]
• The current ICBM support helicopter base: 51°02′56″N 59°51′12″E home to the 84th Independent Helicopter Squadron of the 13th Red Banner Rocket Division^[2]

Interceptor base

The facility featured three revetment compounds.

The 412th Fighter Aviation Regiment (412 IAP PVO) flew from the base from August 1949 with the La-11, MiG-15, and MiG-17 to 1962.^[3] By the 1970s it was flying the Sukhoi Su-9 (Fishpot) aircraft.^[4] The regiment replaced it in 1978 with the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-23M (Flogger-B).^[4] From 1953-60 it reported to the 101st Fighter Aviation Division PVO, and then to the 19th Air Defence Corps of the 4th Independent Air Defence Army. It disbanded in 1993.

Other reporting of the 763rd Fighter Aviation Regiment (763 IAP) flying MiG-23 aircraft in 1991^[5] appears to be incorrect. The 763rd Fighter Aviation Regiment was, it appears from more recent data, flying from Yugorsk-2.

ICBM base

Dombarovsky is also the home of the 13th Dombarovsky Red Banner Division, 31st Missile Army of the Strategic Rocket Forces. The base was built during the mid-60s along with the majority of the Soviet ICBM bases.

The first base commander was Major-General Dmitri Chaplygin.^[6] Up to 10 units of Strategic Rocket Forces were based in the area, each with anywhere from 6 to 10 operational silos. At the peak of operations, Dombarovsky maintained a total of 64 silos on full alert. By 2002, according to the Russian press, the number had dropped to 52. The missiles deployed in the region were primarily the RS-20 type and its sub-variants.

On 22 December 2004, the Rocket Forces conducted from the base a test launch of an R-36M2 to the Kamchatka Peninsula.^[7]

Commercial launches

With the conversion of the R-36M ICBM for use as a satellite launch vehicle, the Dnepr system, Dombarovsky has launched a number of commercial payloads. These civilian launches are operated by the Russian Air Force^{[citation needed]} on behalf of the launcher's operator, Russian/Ukrainian consortium Kosmotras. Kosmotras calls the facility Yasny launch base, and has constructed additional facilities necessary for commercial satellite launch operations, including clean room integration facilities.^[8]

Launch	Date (UTC)	Vehicle	Payload	Launch pad	Result	Remarks / References
1	12 July 2006	Dnepr	Genesis I	Dombarovsky	Success	Bigelow Aerospace payload, in a 550 km, 64.5 degree inclination orbit [citation needed]
2	28 June 2007	Dnepr	Genesis II	Dombarovsky	Success	Bigelow Aerospace payload, orbit nearly identical to Genesis I [citation needed]
3	1 October 2008	Dnepr	THEOS	Dombarovsky	Success	Launched for GISTDA[citation needed]
4	15 June 2010	Dnepr	Prisma, Picard, BPA-1	Dombarovsky	Success	[9]
5	17 August 2011	Dnepr	Sich-2 NigeriaSat-2 NX RASAT EduSAT AprizeSat-5 AprizeSat-6 BPA-2	Dombarovsky	Success	[10]
6	22 August 2013	Dnepr	KOMPSAT-5	Dombarovsky	Success	South Korea's satellite in LEO orbit[11]
7	21 November 2013	Dnepr	iCube-1 STSAT-3 DubaiSat-2 SkySat 1 WNISAT 1 Lem (BRITE-PL) AprizeSat-7/8 UniSat 5 Delfi-n3Xt Dove 3/4 Triton 1 CINEMA 2/3 OPTOS CubeBug 2 GOMX 1 NEE-02 Krysaor FUNcube-1 HiNCube ZACUBE-1 BPA 3 HumSat-D PUCP-SAT 1 First-MOVE UWE 3 VELOX-P 2 BeakerSat 1 $50SAT QubeScout S1 Wren Pocket-PUCP	Dombarovsky	Success	32 satellites, most of them cubesats[12][13]
8	19 June 2014	Dnepr	Deimos-2 KazEOSat 2 UniSat 6 SaudiSat-4 AprizeSat-9/10 Hodoyoshi 3 / Hodoyoshi 4 BRITE CA-1/2 TabletSat-Aurora BugSat 1 Perseus-M 1/2 QB50 P1/P2 NanoSatC-Br 1 DTUSat 2 POPSAT-HIP 1 PolyITAN 1 PACE Duchifat-1 Flock-1c 1-11 AeroCube 6 Lemur-1 ANTELSAT Tigrisat	Dombarovsky	Success	37 satellites[14]
9	6 November 2014	Dnepr	ASNARO 1 Hodoyoshi 1 ChubuSat 1 TSUBAME QSAT-EOS	Dombarovsky	Success	Japanese satellites[15]
10	25 March 2015	Dnepr	KOMPSAT-3A	Dombarovsky	Success	South Korea's satellite in LEO orbit[16]

References

1. "412th Fighter Aviation Regiment PVO". Soviet Armed Forces 1945-1991. Retrieved 4 December 2022.
2. "13th Orenburgskaya Red Banner Missile Division". Soviet Armed Forces 1945-1991. Retrieved 4 December 2022.
3. "412th Fighter Aviation Regiment PVO". Archived from the original on 27 February 2024. Retrieved 8 July 2024.
4. PHASEOUT OF FISHPOT IN APVO STRANYY AIRFIELDS USSR, February 1981, CREST: CIA-RDP81T00380R000100980001-5, Central Intelligence Agency, Washington, DC.
5. "Aviatsiya PVO". Aviabaza KPOI.
6. Dombarovskiy (Yasny) ICBM site Archived February 8, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
7. "Dombarovskiy". Astronautix.com. 17 November 2007. Archived from the original on 16 December 2013. Retrieved 15 May 2008.
8. "Yasny launch base". Kosmotras website.
9. Stephen Clark (15 June 2010). "French Sun Satellite and Swedish Experiment Blast Off on Russian Rocket". Spaceflight Now (Space.com). Retrieved 22 November 2013.
10. "RASAT takes off into space". Anatolia News Agency. 17 August 2011.
11. William Graham (22 August 2013). "Russian Dnepr rocket launches with Arirang-5". NASASpaceflight.com.
12. Stephen Clark (21 November 2013). "Silo-launched Dnepr rocket delivers 32 satellites to space". Spaceflight Now. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
13. Stephen Clark (21 November 2013). "Silo-launched Dnepr rocket delivers 32 satellites to space". Spaceflight Now. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
14. Stephen Clark (19 June 2014). "Russian Dnepr rocket lofts record haul of 37 satellites". Spaceflight Now. Retrieved 19 June 2014.
15. Stephen Clark (6 November 2014). "Japanese satellites launched on Soviet-era missile". Spaceflight Now. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
16. William Graham and Chris Bergin (25 March 2015). "Russia's Dnepr rocket launches Kompsat-3A mission". NASASpaceflight.com.