Yantar (satellite)

Yantar (Russian: Янтарь meaning amber) is a series of Russian (previously Soviet) reconnaissance satellites, which supplemented and eventually replaced the Zenit spacecraft. Kosmos 2175, a Yantar-4K2 or Kobalt spacecraft, was the first satellite to be launched by the Russian Federation following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Yantar-Terilen was the first real-time digital system. Yantar satellites also formed the basis for the later Orlets, Resurs and Persona satellites. 179 have been launched, nine of which were lost in launch failures. All Yantar satellites were launched using the Soyuz-U carrier rocket until Kosmos 2480 in 2012 which was announced as the last launch of that rocket from Plesetsk. Subsequent launches used the modernized Soyuz-2.1a rocket. The last Yantar mission was Kosmos 2505, a Yantar-4K2M or Kobalt-M, launched on 5 June 2015. Reconnaissance missions have been taken over by the Persona class of satellites.

In 1964, Soviet design bureau OKB-1 was tasked with improving on the newly operational Zenit-2 reconnaissance satellites. They had three streams of work: modifying Zenit satellites, a manned reconnaissance craft called Soyuz-R and a new photoreconnaissance satellite based on Soyuz-R. The third stream was code-named Yantar and initially there were to be two types - Yantar-1 for medium resolution imaging and Yantar-2 for high resolution. In 1967, a new high resolution satellite was proposed called Yantar-2K. Yantar-2K received government support with the first flight originally planned for 1970, although this deadline slipped.

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