Burevestnik : a new Russian ASAT?

[B. Hendrickx]

As mentioned earlier in this thread, two different satellites are apparently being developed under the Burevestnik project, one called Burevestnik-M (approved in September 2011) and another named Burevestnik-KA-M (approved in December 2015). Presumably, the two satellites have the same platform, but carry different payloads. Burevestnik-KA-M has an optical payload called OAN provided by the State Institute of Applied Optics (GIPO) which includes a laser rangefinder  built by NII Polyus (see post 58). It also seems to carry an explosive device produced by KNIIM (see post 35).

As for Burevestnik-M, a key player in that part of the project has earlier been identified as KB Tochmash (the former “Nudelman design bureau”), which received a contract for the project from CNIIHM on November 1, 2011. KB Tochmash in turn awarded a contract to the Scientific Research Institute of Television (NIIT) to developed a star tracker for its payload.

KB Tochmash’s payload for Burevestnik-M now turns out to have the abbreviation ONB. A contract awarded by KB Tochmash in 2015 was for the certification of equipment needed to test elements of “Burevestnik-M-ONB, Nudol and Bagulnik” (the latter is an air-defense missile system).

https://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/common-info.html?regNumber=31502356563

“ONB” almost certainly stands for “optical navigation unit” (оптико-навигационный блок), a system most likely needed to maintain the satellite’s proper orientation in space and/or to detect and track target satellites. This term is seen in a biography of NIIT researcher Anastasiya Chirkunova on the website of the St.-Petersburg Electrotechnical University (SPbGETU LETI), where she holds a teaching position at the Department of Television and Video Technology.

https://etu.ru/ru/fakultety/fakultet-radiotehniki-i-telekommunikaciy/sostav-fakulteta/kafedra-televideniya-i-videotehniki/rukovodstvo-sostav-kafedry/chirkunova-anastasiya-anatolevna

In 2013, Chirkunova was involved in “developing, building, testing and delivering a television camera for an experimental version of an optical navigation unit”. In 2014 she went on to study “the possibility of creating electro-optical equipment for a mini satellite”, most likely Burevestnik. 

In 2017 Chirkunova completed a PhD dissertation on television cameras to observe “low-contrast objects”. One of its objectives was to study the spectral characteristics of cameras needed to detect thermal insulation blankets covering satellites.
The full dissertation and a summary are herе:
https://docplayer.ru/64950537-Chirkunova-anastasiya-anatolevna.html
https://etu.ru/assets/files/nauka/dissertacii/2017/Chirkunova/avtoreferat-Chirkunova.pdf

The dissertation’s probable link to Burevestnik is supported by the fact that it was reviewed among others by a specialist of KB Tochmash:
https://etu.ru/assets/files/nauka/dissertacii/2017/Chirkunova/Otziv-na-avtoreferat_KB-Toch-mash.pdf

Several publications co-authored by Chirkunova are probably related to Burevestnik, including this patent for a device to simulate a starry background:
https://patents.google.com/patent/RU155206U1/en

The ONB payload is also mentioned in a most unusual place, namely the Russian social media platform “VKontakte”. Back in 2016, NIIT researcher Andrei Mantsvetov posted a picture of what appears to be his family with the following caption:
“The picture was made with the help of the star tracker TVK ONB, factory number N°007, pixel resolution 1024x1024, frame rate 8 Hz. It can see stars of magnitude 7, but we are all brighter!”. 

“TVK ONB” can be deciphered as “television camera for an optical navigation unit”. The technical characteristics given by Mantsvetov are identical to those of the Burevestnik-M camera. Mantsvetov’s bio on the LETI website acknowledges his involvement in Burevestnik-M (see post 58).

NIIT’s star tracker is also seen in an article featuring the LETI university department where Mantsvetov and Chirkunova work  (see attachment 1). It weighs less than 300 grams and is capable of maintaining orientation with an accuracy of 5 arc seconds. It was on display at the MAKS-2017 aerospace show near Moscow and shown to Vladimir Putin, who reportedly “highly praised it”. 

https://etu.ru/ru/nauchnaya-i-innovacionnaya-deyatelnost/novosti1/i-na-marse-budut-kamery-leti-razrabotki-novyh-sistem-kosmicheskogo-televideniya-v-pervom-elektrotehnicheskom

There are indications that it had already flown in space by that time, probably on one of the small payloads launched piggyback on the Rokot booster in 2013-2015 (Kosmos-2491, 2499, 2504). These were presumably prototype Burevestnik satellites.


The same NIIT camera has also been given a role in KB Arsenal’s TEM project to develop a 1-megawatt space-based nuclear reactor (now called Zevs). This can be determined from a paper published this April:

https://www.elibrary.ru/item.asp?id=45178002
(full paper available for registered users of elibrary.ru)

It says one of three TV cameras of NIIT has been selected to make temperature readings of the nuclear reactor’s thermal control system. It is described as “a thermal/television camera of an optical navigation unit”, indicating it works at least partially in the infrared range of the spectrum. The technical characteristics given for it are identical to those of the Burevestnik-M camera. Pictures of the camera (one with and one without a Sun shade) published in the article confirm this (attachment 2). Two of the cameras will be mounted on the solar panels of TEM’s bus and they should be capable of seeing objects with a diameter of 0.01 to 2 m from distances of 3.1 m to 31 m. Their position can be seen in a schematic representation of TEM  (see attachment 3), where they are designated БТ (BT), which stands for “wireless thermal imager”.

[B. Hendrickx]

Some newly released Google Earth imagery gives an idea of the current status of construction work at sites 7511/3 near Pervomaiskoe in the Tambov province and 7511/4 at Plesetsk airport. Site 7511/3 will be used for storage of elements of Burevestnik and 7511/4 is apparently intended to handle take-offs and landings of MiG-31BM aircraft carrying the “293” solid-fuel rocket that will launch Burevestnik satellites into orbit.  The latest updates on these construction sites were in posts 50, 51 and 54 in this thread about a year ago. 

7511/3

Progress here has been very slow. All that appears to have happened between November 2019 and June 2020 is the construction of a railroad track that connects one of the existing buildings with the railroad running to Tambov. Barely any changes are seen in the latest imagery (May 2021), indicating that the work has come to a virtual standstill. There is no sign yet of any of the new buildings that were supposed to have been built according to court documentation published in 2019-2020 (see post 50).

7511/4

Some progress has been made here between June 2020 and May 2021, although not spectacular. Work is continuing on what appears to be a 900 meter extension of the “right” side of the runway (designated 22) as well as roads leading to nearby hangars.

Forest has also been cleared several kilometers due east of the runway centerline about 1 km from where another clearing has been for many years, most likely for navigation beacons that are part of the instrument landing system.

The new clearing is most likely needed to install new beacons required to support landings on the new runway section. This is confirmed by the fact that the distance between the two clearings in the forest is about the same as the length of the new runway section. Also, work to lay the foundations for the new beacons and construct a road to them was the subject of a contract that appeared on the government procurement website last summer:
 
https://zakupki.gov.ru/223/contract/public/contract/view/general-information.html?style44=false&id=9648733&backUrl=511f0945-d273-4697-accb-3ac7927e227f   

The new beacons are known as DPRM-221. “221” seems to refer to runway 22 and DPRM is the abbreviation for an “outer non-directional beacon”, which is traditionally located 4 km from the runway threshold (exactly the distance observed here).  An environmental impact assessment report on 7511/4 released about two years ago mentioned not only outer but also inner non-directional beacons (BPRM). Ground for those has apparently been broken about 1 km due east from the threshold of the new runway section.

The same report said the DPRM and BPRM beacons would be installed on both ends of the runway, but so far all the work seems to be concentrated only on the right end of the runway. Also, there are no signs so far of other construction work related to Burevestnik in Areas 141 and 32T of the cosmodrome (see post 59). All in all, the pace of the work seems to be relatively slow.
 

[B. Hendrickx]

A document describing a court case between TsNIIMash and NPO Tekhnomash makes it possible to identify the Kosmos-2535 and 2536 satellites launched in July 2019 as 14F157 and 14F153 (or possibly vice versa). These are likely small satellites built by the CNIIHM institute and one or both may belong to the Burevestnik program. More in the Kosmos-2535/2536/2537/2538 thread (see Reply 105):

https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=48521.100

As far as I’m aware, nothing else has leaked out on Burevestnik in recent months except for two contracts that appeared on zakupki.gov.ru.  Both were for components ordered by NPO Iskra for the solid-fuel “293” rocket that will launch Burevestnik satellites from the belly of a MiG-31BM aircraft.

https://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/common-info.html?purchaseId=10694773&purchaseMethodType=EP

This is a contract under which a company known as NPP Krasnoznamyonets was to analyze the results of tests of electric ignitors for 14D813 and 14S47, probably the second stage and upper stage of the rocket. The document refers back to the contract for Burevestnik signed between the Ministry of Defense and NPK KBM (the overall program co-ordinator) on September 1, 2011. One of the documents identifies a “project chief designer” by the name M.A. Tikhonov. This is probably NPO Iskra’s chief designer of the “293” rocket. The work was to be finished by late September.

https://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/common-info.html?regNumber=32110487359

This is for work called “Burevestnik-KA-P”, under which FNPTs Altai is to provide “filler material” for all three stages of the “293” rocket. It is a follow-up to a contract signed in 2020 and described here in Reply 47. The documents refer back to the government contract for Burevestnik signed between the Ministry of Defense and NPK KBM on December 1, 2015. Under the new contract, FNPTs Altai is to analyze the use of new chemicals in the filler material due to a change of manufacturer. The work was to be finished by the end of the year.

[B. Hendrickx]

Fresh Google Earth imagery of Plesetsk from June shows that little progress has been made in the construction of infrastructure for Burevestnik. This was the first new imagery to appear in nearly a year.

As mentioned in earlier posts, some of the new infrastructure is being built at a construction site known as 7511/4, situated at Plesetsk airport (see Replies 51, 54 and 61 in this thread). The go-ahead for the work was given by a government contract awarded in December 2019. By June 2020 the existing runway at the airport was being extended. One year later this work had advanced further, although not spectacularly.   

Now, another year later, not much has changed. The only significant new feature is what appears to be the first part of a taxiway connecting the runway extension with nearby hangars. The “22” marking on the threshold of the existing runway is gone and has been repainted about 40 m to the west. Apparently, the threshold has been moved to make sure that incoming and outgoing planes don’t hamper work on the new runway section, so this is likely just a temporary change.

Although the 7511/4 site is linked in documentation to “project 14K168” (Burevestnik), it is not really clear why Burevestnik needs the runway extension. The existing runway should be long enough to handle take-offs and landings of Burevestnik’s MiG-31BM carrier aircraft, even if it is equipped with two external fuel tanks to increase its range (which may be needed if the drop zone for the “293” solid-fuel rocket carried under the MiG's belly is located far away from Plesetsk).   

Also planned at Plesetsk was construction work for projects 14K167 (Nivelir), 14K168 (Burevestnik) and 14K177 (unknown, possibly Numizmat) under the code name 7511/OKR. This work was to be conducted in Area 141 (just northeast of the town of Mirnyy)  and Area 32T (about 30 km northeast of Mirnyy) (for more details see Replies 17, 27 and 59).

The new imagery of Area 141 shows that one building there has been demolished and is being replaced by a new one that will be connected to the local railroad network. Indications are that this is what is identified in documentation as Building 5, which will probably be used for the storage of “293” rockets. There are no clear signs yet of groundbreaking work for Building 370, an earth-sheltered building for electric tests of the entire stack (the “293” rocket and its payload). There is a significant new construction zone less than one kilometer south of Area 141, but it is presumably unrelated. 

There is no new Google Earth imagery of Area 32T, where Building 130 (the old Rokot assembly building) was to be modified to support the three aforementioned projects. However, I’m told that no changes to the building are seen in recent commercial satellite imagery of the area.

The whole construction effort has all the hallmarks of turning into what the Russians call a dolgostroi, a term coined in the Soviet days for protracted construction projects. Whether the slow pace of the work is the result of financial, technical or other issues is, of course, impossible to say. At any rate, if the Russians still have the intention of operationally deploying Burevestnik at Plesetsk, that is not likely to occur any time soon. The project was officially started in September 2011, more than a decade ago. While the interceptor satellites themselves already seem to have made a number of orbital test flights using conventional launch vehicles, other elements of the project are clearly needing a lot more time to come to fruition.

[B. Hendrickx]

After a long period of relative inactivity, a significant amount of work was done at the 7511/4 construction site at Plesetsk airport over the summer months. As can be seen in new Google Earth imagery from August, considerable progress was made in the construction of a taxiway next to the runway extension (compare to imagery from June).

There is also fresh imagery of construction site 7511/3 near Pervomaiskoe in the Tambov region. The plan was to build infrastructure here to store hardware for Burevestnik (more details in post 50). However, the new imagery (from September) shows no changes compared to what was seen a little over a year earlier. In fact, nothing much has happened here since the area was cleared of forest in 2018/2019. All indications are that this construction work is suffering very lengthy delays or has been canceled altogether. 

[EthanBlatt]

Hi, made a new account just to ask this question.  I'm extremely impressed by the open source intelligence used here.

I noticed a few lines in some of the writeups in this thread.

> This is for work “to determine the safety of operating Object 08 with Product 293 under the influence of naturally and artificially produced electromagnetic fields”. The code for the work is “08EMP” (EMP standing for “electromagnetic field”) and it was to be finished in four months time.

> Napryazheniye, or "voltage."

There was also some other information, like one of the suppliers supplying specifically Octogen/HMX (which you specifically said was also used in nuclear devices, and not commonly used in Russian rockets as solid fuel is rarely used at all).

Am I crazy for thinking that Burevestnik might have been the Russian program for this space based nuclear EMP device that's been in the news? 

[Steven Pietrobon]

Hi, made a new account just to ask this question.  I'm extremely impressed by the open source intelligence us
Am I crazy for thinking that Burevestnik might have been the Russian program for this space based nuclear EMP device that's been in the news? 

Welcome to the forum! The recent news is probably referring to the Ekipazh project. See B. Hendrickx latest post on the subject.

https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=48342.msg2568269#msg2568269

[B. Hendrickx]

> This is for work “to determine the safety of operating Object 08 with Product 293 under the influence of naturally and artificially produced electromagnetic fields”. The code for the work is “08EMP” (EMP standing for “electromagnetic field”) and it was to be finished in four months time.
....
There was also some other information, like one of the suppliers supplying specifically Octogen/HMX (which you specifically said was also used in nuclear devices, and not commonly used in Russian rockets as solid fuel is rarely used at all).

Am I crazy for thinking that Burevestnik might have been the Russian program for this space based nuclear EMP device that's been in the news?

08EMP: I wouldn't interpret the "artificial electromagnetic fields" here as anything created by a nuclear explosion, if that's what you're alluding to. Most likely something much more innocent, so don't read too much into this.

Octogen/HMX: this is a performance-enhancing compound that may be added to the solid propellant stored aboard the "293" rocket, the black-colored rocket suspended under the MiG-31BM. It's also used in detonators of nuclear weapons, but that's a totally different application that has nothing to do with Burevestnik.

The "293" rocket is likely designed to orbit small interceptor satellites, not the type of satellite that would be equipped with nuclear reactors or any other nuclear devices. So no, Burevestnik is definitely not the Russian space weapon that's been causing all the fuss in Washington. As I have explained, a plausible candidate for that is Ekipazh, KB Arsenal's nuclear-powered electronic jamming satellite.

Meanwhile, the status of Burevestnik is highly uncertain. While some of the interceptor satellites have probably made test flights on conventional launch vehicles, the question is when or if Russia is going to launch them using the MiG-31BM/293 combination. As explained earlier in this thread, the construction of related infrastructure at Plesetsk (including an extension of the runway at the cosmodrome's airport) appears to have been underway for some time, but Google Earth imagery of Plesetsk hasn't been updated since August 2022, making it hard to assess how far this work has advanced. Until then, the pace of the work had been relatively slow and some of it hadn't even started yet. Anyway, an orbital launch by the MiG-31BM/293, whenever it takes place, would most probably come out of the blue, with little or no advance warning. 

[Star One]

Hi, made a new account just to ask this question.  I'm extremely impressed by the open source intelligence us
Am I crazy for thinking that Burevestnik might have been the Russian program for this space based nuclear EMP device that's been in the news? 

Welcome to the forum! The recent news is probably referring to the Ekipazh project. See B. Hendrickx latest post on the subject.

https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=48342.msg2568269#msg2568269

But as I said in the other thread it’s not clear how a nuclear powered satellite can be considered to be breaking the 1967 Outer Space Agreement, this was something that was clearly stated in the WH latest statements on the topic. That whatever it is the White House regards it as  violating this.

[Blackstar]

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/russian-federation/why-russia-might-put-nuclear-weapon-space

[B. Hendrickx]

Fresh Google Earth imagery of Plesetsk (September 2024) makes it possible to assess progress made on infrastructure for the Burevestnik project. This is the first new imagery of the cosmodrome to appear since August 2022.

7511/4

One construction site related to Burevestnik is located at the cosmodrome’s airport and called 7511/4 (see Replies 51, 54, 61, 63). This has always been linked in procurement and court documentation to 14K168, which is one of the code names for the Burevestnik project. The most conspicuous feature of the construction site is a roughly 1 kilometer extension of one end of the runway (labeled “22”). Judging from the available imagery, work on this extension got underway around mid-2020. In addition to that, new navigation beacons were installed about 4 km from the new runway threshold. The latest imagery indicates that the runway extension is now operational (tire tracks can be seen on it and an aircraft seems to be taxiing toward it). New features seen near the runway extension are a big hangar and what appear to be two aprons. Construction work near the new runway section still seems to be ongoing. (see attachment 1)

There were also plans to extend the other end of the runway (labeled 04), but there are no indications yet that this is happening. One new feature near the other end of the runway is a platform with what may be a mobile air defense radar placed on it. One such radar (designated 55Zh6UM or Nebo-UM) was planned to be installed at the airport as part of the 7511/4 construction effort. (see attachment 2)

Also noticeable in the latest imagery is that the air traffic control building has been demolished and is being replaced by a new building. It is known from one document on the 7511/4 work that it was supposed to have been lengthened by 12 m in order to install new communications equipment. With the building now completely gone, it is not clear where aircraft flying in and out of the airport are currently being controlled from. (see attachment 3)

The most obvious connection between Burevestnik and the airport construction work is that it is needed to support take-offs and landings of modified MiG-31BM fighter jets carrying the “293” solid-fuel rockets and their payloads. The heavily loaded aircraft will require longer take-off runs than “ordinary” MiG jets, which may be one of the reasons why the runway had to be extended.  It is highly questionable though that the construction work has been done solely in support of Burevestnik. It will obviously also benefit other traffic in and out of the airport.

7511/OKR

Other infrastructure for Burevestnik was to be built in Areas 141 and 32T of the cosmodrome under the code name 7511/OKR (see Replies 17, 27, 59).  The work in Area 141 (just northeast of the town of Mirnyy) involved the “reconstruction” of Buildings nr. 201 (an assembly building) and nr. 5 (for storage of solid-fuel rockets) as well as the construction of a new earth-sheltered building (nr. 370) for electric tests of assembled solid-fuel rockets and upper composites containing liquid fuel (most likely the “293” rocket and its payload). The plan for Area 32T (some 40 km northeast of Mirnyy) was to renovate Building nr. 130 (the former Tsiklon-3/Rokot assembly building), presumably for payload processing. I should add that 7511/OKR is linked in documentation not only to 14K168 (Burevestnik), but also to 14K167 (Nivelir) and 14K177 (unknown), a possible sign that the “293” rocket will also be used for other projects.

The only major change that can be seen in imagery of Area 141 is the appearance of what seems to be a large assembly building (see attachment 4). This has come in the place of a much smaller building that was torn down in 2021. The first signs of the new building were visible by mid-2022 and it now appears to have been more or less completed, at least on the outside. It measures roughly 140x50 m, giving a total area of about 7,000 square meters. This is much more than the area given for Building 5 (60 square meters) and significantly less than the area given for Building 201 (11,267 square meters). It is definitely not Building 370, drawings of which appeared in procurement documentation in 2019 (see Reply 59). There aren’t any signs that even groundbreaking work for that has begun. The new building may be part of another construction project that was planned for Area 141 under the code name 500/141-V. This, among other things, involved the construction of new infrastructure to process the Volga upper stage.   

As for Area 32T, Google Earth imagery of that has not been updated since August 2021, at which time no external changes had been made to Building 130. One also wonders how the modifications to this building originally scheduled under 7511/OKR have been affected by the later decision to resume Rokot operations at Plesetsk (using the modified Rokot-M launch vehicle).

Further indications that progress on 7511/OKR has been slow come from court documents published in the past three years:
https://kad.arbitr.ru/Card/eae2de6d-14bb-4f4e-bef8-7684b853cb67
https://kad.arbitr.ru/Card/46818b42-0a64-45bd-9548-85ce165d2d96
https://kad.arbitr.ru/Card/dd44a6e0-ac46-492b-bcd1-4a9598642af1

The Ministry of Defense awarded an initial contract for 7511/OKR to the GVSU 14 military construction company in March 2019. This covered only surveying work and the drawing up of design documentation, all of which was to be completed by March 2021. What can be learned from the court documents is that none of the scheduled work was finished on time. Whether it was carried out at all is unclear. Neither is it clear if the prime contractor was given a follow-up contract to proceed with the actual construction work.

7511/3

Another place where infrastructure for Burevestnik was supposed to be built was a military base in the Tambov province roughly 450 km southeast of Moscow. The construction site has been referred to in documentation as 7511/3. The plan was to construct several buildings here for the storage of Burevestnik hardware (more in Replies 6, 11, 50 and 61). The Ministry of Defense awarded an initial contract for work at this location back in 2015. Preparations began in 2019 with the clearing of forest in the southwestern part of the base, but little has happened there since. No changes are visible either in the most recent Google Earth imagery from August 2024 and it is safe to conclude now that this work has either been suspended or canceled altogether.



All in all, the current status of Burevestnik remains hard to determine. Much of the infrastructure for the project at Plesetsk’s airport appears to be in place, but it is most likely not needed for Burevestnik alone, making it difficult to assess what this tells us about the status of Burevestnik itself. There is no clear evidence that the construction of other planned infrastructure at Plesetsk has begun, nor are there any signs that the storage facilities for the project near Tambov are still planned to be constructed. I see three possible scenarios to explain all this:

a) The project is suffering significant delays, but all its ultimate goals remain intact.

b) The project has been scaled down, for instance by limiting the production of Burevestnik satellites and air-launched “293” rockets (eliminating the need for the storage facilities near Tambov). If necessary, Burevestnik satellites can probably also be launched by conventional launch vehicles such as the Soyuz-1v, Rokot-M or Start-1M. In fact, one or more such test flights have probably already taken place. 

c) The project has been canceled.

There could be multiple reasons for any of these scenarios. Aside from possible financial and technical issues, another factor coming into play could be the successful test of the Nudol direct-ascent ASAT missile against a defunct Soviet satellite in November 2021. Direct-ascent ASAT systems have certain advantages over the co-orbital type ASAT system that Burevestnik most likely is, most notably the fact that they can attack their targets with little or no warning. In addition to that, Burevestnik’s “ceiling” (the maximum altitude it can reach) is probably not much higher than that of Nudol, meaning that it is essentially aimed against the same range of satellites in low Earth orbit.     

[B. Hendrickx]

Burevestnik appears in a recently published history of NII Televideniya (NIIT), an organization based in St.-Petersburg that builds television cameras for both manned and unmanned spacecraft. 
https://niitv.ru/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/90_let_nii-televideniya.pdf

NIIT’s involvement in Burevestnik has been known for many years and in fact made it possible to uncover the very existence of the project back in 2018 (see earlier posts here). NIIT developed a television camera for a star tracker that is installed aboard the satellites. In the Burevestnik project NIIT acts as a subcontractor to KB Tochmash (the former Nudelman design bureau), which has a long history of developing ASAT-related systems going back to the Soviet days.   

According to the NIIT history, the institute worked on Burevestnik from 2012 to 2016 under the contract name Burevestnik-M-ONB-TVK. ONB stands for “optical navigation unit” and TVK for “television camera” (more on that in Reply 60). The camera makes it possible to obtain digital images of stars and “determine the coordinates and intensity of signals of detected objects”. Whether the latter refers to stars or ASAT targets is not clear. “Intensity of signals” should probably be interpreted here as brightness.

The history notes that two of the star trackers are in orbit, but does not give further details on the host satellites. The fact that the star trackers have already been tested in space can also be determined from two other sources:

- a newsletter of LETI university (which has close ties with NIIT) published in 2016
https://etu.ru/assets/files/university/elektrik/2016/04/07-3178/03.pdf
This refers to star trackers (plural) of NIIT already being successfully operated in orbit at the time of writing.

- a May 2019 presentation on space-based TV cameras by Andrei Mantsvetov, one of the star tracker’s designers, who works for both LETI and NIIT
https://www.lektorium.tv/node/34277
Mantsvetov talks about the star tracker from 50:30 to 55:25. He doesn’t reveal anything about the project it is intended for, but does say he was at KB Tochmash when one of the star trackers was being tested in orbit. One slide shows what appears to be an image of a star field produced by the star tracker. Mantsvetov says it was taken during the 9th month of the mission and that some of the features are actually not stars, but artefacts caused by heavily charged particles (indicated as ТЗЧ in the slide).

The only plausible host satellites for the star trackers prior to May 2019 are three small satellites (Kosmos-2491, 2499 and 2504) launched piggyback on the Rokot booster in 2013-2015. The last one of these is known to have had the designator 14F153. It is therefore very likely that these were early, experimental versions of Burevestnik (which itself was approved in September 2011).  Another 14F153 satellite was one of two Kosmos satellites launched in July 2019 (Kosmos-2535 or 2536). All these satellites are still in orbit, but Kosmos-2491 and 2499 have broken up and Kosmos-2504 and 2535/2536 are most likely no longer operational.

What can also be learned from the NIIT history is that NIIT received two other contracts from KB Tochmash for unmanned space projects sometime in the period 2002-2011. One had the name “Istok-M-NIIT” and envisaged the development of TV equipment operating in the visible and ultraviolet parts of the spectrum to detect “small and point-like objects”. The other, named STZ-TA, called for developing machine vision systems “to monitor and determine the parameters of the relative motion of space objects”. There may be a link with two outboard TV cameras called KT-277 and KT-278 mentioned in a 2017 NIIT book on space-based TV cameras.
https://emc.tusur.ru/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Teoriya-i-praktika-kosmicheskogo-televideniya.pdf
(p. 240-241)
KT-277 was designed to operate in the visible and near-infrared parts of the spectrum and KT-278 in the near ultraviolet. They are not known to have flown on any manned spacecraft or civilian satellites. It is not clear though if this collaboration with KB Tochmash was related to Burevestnik, which got underway in 2011.


While several Burevestnik satellites appear to have been launched aboard conventional launch vehicles, all indications are that the ultimate goal of the project was to launch them with solid-fuel “293” rockets attached to modified MiG-31BM jet fighters. Related construction work at Plesetsk’s aerodrome (under the code name 7511/4) has been underway since around 2020. This has been documented earlier in this thread, including the previous post, which was based on Google Earth imagery of September 2024.

One feature of particular interest in that imagery is a hangar that was built near a new runway section sometime between 2022 and 2024. It is a drive-through hangar, with an entrance and exit on opposite sides. Interestingly, it is too small to house the transport and passenger aircraft usually seen in satellite photography at Plesetsk airport, but is the right size to house one or more MiG-31BM jets. It is surrounded by what appear to be four lightning protection towers, which are typically seen around buildings housing munitions, explosives and other flammable materials. The reason they are needed here may well be that the hangar will be used for final pre-flight preparations of MiG-31BM aircraft with the “293” solid-fuel rocket and hydrazine-fueled payloads.

When or if such flights will take place is anyone’s guess. The September 2024 imagery shows no signs of other construction work related to Burevestnik that had been planned elsewhere at the cosmodrome. However, the work at the airport still seems to be related the project. It was the subject of a court document published last month dealing with a contract to install expansion joints on the runway. This was finished late last year and is still linked to 14K168, one of the code names for Burevestnik.
https://kad.arbitr.ru/Card/2c040557-1655-4bcc-a843-e67741b1cfd4