Mig-29 - Take-off Magazine

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be either deep or ‘lite’. The former option results in the MiG-29SMT featuring the
highest combat capabilities for earlier built aircraft of the type. Such fighters have
already been supplied to countries in the Middle East and North Africa.
The MiG-29SD and MiG-29SM offer less expensive upgrade packages, with their
avionics not being subject to such drastic updating. Nonetheless, these versions
acquire a number of advanced capabilities in using latest weapons systems.
In addition to modernising operational MiG-29s, MiG Corp.’s work is in full swing
on developing a heavily upgraded derivative of the Fulcrum, the MiG-35, that will
hit the market after 2009–10. The MiG-35’s advanced technical solutions also are
to be embodied in the MiG-29M/M2 intermediate derivative carrying less expensive
avionics and weapons suites commonised with the MiG-29SMT. Andrey Fomin
reviews MiG-29 upgrade programmes
Irkut makes first Su-30MKA jets for Algeria
Venezuelan Su-30 deliveries on schedule
MMRCA tender kicks off at last
Indonesia to get more Sukhoi fighters
Ilyushin Finance Co. to deliver planes to Cuba and Iran
Ka-32 exports on the rise
MILITARY AVIATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Su-34 fielded with Air Force
Growing number of upgraded Su-27SMs
RusAF Chief tries Yak-130 out
Skat: unmanned future of combat aircraft?
The Skat low-observable jet-powered combat unmanned aerial vehicle (UCAV) under
development by MiG Corp. became a most interesting and unexpected novelty of the
MAKS 2007 air show. Unveiling the Skat’s full-scale mockup to the media in a MiG
Corp. hangar at LII’s airfield in Zhukovsky on the third day of the show made quite
a stir, because no details on MiG Corp.’s UCAV development had been available and
the Skat’s demonstration at MAKS 2007, albeit planned by the developer, had not
been advertised at all. Permission to unveil the Skat UCAV was given by Russian
President Vladimir Putin on 21 August. As a result, a full-size Skat mockup was
displayed in a hangar of MiG Corp. at Gromov LII’s airfield, rather than at the display
ground, and few media people were invited, among which Take-off editor was lucky
to be
COSMONAUTICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
ISS now run by female.
Another replacement in position in orbit
There has been a change of the crew of the ISS. In October, a woman, NASA
astronaut Peggy Whitson, headed a long-term orbital expedition for the first time in
history of space exploration. She and Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko were
accompanied to the ISS by the first Malaysian cosmonaut Sheikh Muszafar Shukor.
He spent 11 days in orbit and came back to the Earth together with the ISS-15
crew – cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Fyodor Yurchikhin. Alina Chernoivanova tells
about the current mission to the ISS
FSA Chief on prospects of Russian space exploration
Latest space rocket designs at MAKS 2007
Aspects of GLONASS development
take-off november 2007
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