The Arktika-M satellite is scheduled to lift off on February 28 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

A Soyuz-2 launch vehicle and a Fregat booster will place the spacecraft into a highly elliptical orbit, according to Ivan Moskatinyev, Deputy Chief Designer at the Lavochkin Research and Production Association.

Every 15-30 minutes, the new satellite will provide the Hydrometeorological Center with updates on the terrestrial atmosphere and surface near the North and South poles. This will help create more accurate models for compiling short-term weather forecasts and give researchers a large amount of new data for studying global climate change.