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.
After a two-day delay to conduct additional ground equipment checks, the Soyuz 2.1a rocket flew through clouds above the Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan at 2:07 a.m. EDT on March 22.
The first fully commercial space launch of the Russian Soyuz 2.1a vehicle in 2021, planned for March 20, is expected to orbit 38 various satellites from 18 countries into three different Sun-synchronous orbits.