A large-scale fire broke out at the NPO Avtomatiki enterprise in Yekaterinburg, Russia. This company produces electronics for Soyuz-2 launch vehicles.

Eyewitnesses report that pieces of the building are falling from the roof. According to E1.ru, both the roof and the building itself are on fire.

Welding work was being carried out in the building, and two oxygen cylinders may be on site.

The Russian rescue service reported that firefighters are extinguishing the roof of a building with chemical products, but did not specify the company’s name.

According to preliminary information, the fire covers an area of 800 square meters.

The roof and walls of the shop collapsed due to the fire. The fire spread inside and reached another workshop.

NPO Avtomatiki, part of Roscosmos, is one of the largest Russian enterprises in the development and production of control systems and electronic equipment for space technology. It also specializes in automation control systems for various industries.

According to E1.ru, the building housed a workshop that manufactured control systems for Soyuz-2 launch vehicles, including boards and microcircuits.

Recent reports indicate that the plant supported 94 launches of the Soyuz-2 launch vehicle, created and implemented a control system for manned rockets, and developed a 77-GHz high-frequency car radar.

The Soyuz-2 launch vehicle enables the deployment of spacecraft into a variety of orbits, including low, medium, highly elliptical, solar-synchronous, geotransitional, and geostationary orbits.

The Russian Ministry of Defense utilizes the Soyuz-2 for launching military satellites.

In 2022, a Russian military satellite was launched on a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from the Plesetsk cosmodrome. The Russian Ministry of Defense classifies information about the details of the launch and the purpose of the military satellite.