Maksim covers aerospace developments in Central Asia for Aviation Week. He has worked for Russia's Air Transport Observer magazine and was in charge of several ATO sister aerospace publications after working for the Moscow-based CAST defense think tank.
Maksim has a degree in international relations from MGIMO University, Moscow.
MOSCOW — Long-stalled plans to modernize Russia’s venerable Ilyushin Il-76 transport are set to get under way this year with the first flight of the Il-476 upgrade. Alexander Tulyakov, vice president of Russia’s United Aircraft Corp. (UAC), announced Feb. 15 that the Ulyanovsk-based Aviastar-SP facility, a UAC subsidiary, will hand over a prototype aircraft toward year’s end for the start of flight trials, along with a second aircraft for static tests.
The first upgraded MiG-29UPGs for the Indian air force should be ready for delivery this year now that the prototype has completed its first flight. Its nearly 1-hr. maiden run (below) took place at the Gromov flight-test center at Zhukovsky, near Moscow.
MOSCOW — Russian Space Agency Roscosmos plans to complete the deployment of the national satellite navigation system GLONASS by midyear, with the launch of four additional Glonass spacecraft. Earlier plans that called for ensuring a full operational capability by the end of 2010 had to be scrapped after the loss of three satellites in a Dec. 5 Proton launch mishap (Aerospace DAILY, Dec. 7, 2010).
