Russia's area program chief has shared a picture of a rocket with what seems to be a Russian navy image painted on the aspect.

On Thursday morning, Dmitry Rogozin, head of Russia's Roscosmos area company, shared a photograph on Twitter of a piece of the Angara A1.2 rocket mannequin, emblazoned with a "Z" image.

"That is what the light-class Angara A1.2 seems like earlier than being despatched for flight design exams," Rogozin wrote, translated from Russian.

The "Z" image has grow to be synonymous with Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine after observers famous that it was typically exhibiting up on the aspect of the nation's navy autos.

There was a lot hypothesis about what the image may imply, significantly as there isn't any "Z" letter in Russia's Cyrillic alphabet—as a substitute, a letter resembling the quantity 3 is used to characterize the "Z" sound.

Some have posited that the image is a approach for Russian navy models to speak with each other. Professor Michael Clarke, former director of the protection suppose tank RUSI, instructed Sky Information final month: "Typically these symbols can be location primarily based—they are going to be speaking the place a unit is heading."

Clarke mentioned sure symbols might stand for sure locations or instructions, for instance.

Kamil Galeev, an unbiased researcher and a journalist residing in Moscow, researches id politics in post-Soviet Russia. In a sequence of tweets printed earlier this month, he famous that for some, it might characterize the phrase "zapad," which means "west," or "za pobedy," which means "for victory."

However he additionally famous that the image has been embraced as a pro-Russia emblem extra typically, having made its approach onto civilian automobiles and even t-shirts.

"Anyway, this image invented only a few days in the past grew to become an emblem of recent Russian ideology and nationwide id," he wrote.

Dmitry Rogozin
Dmitry Rogozin, director basic of Roscosmos, pictured at an award ceremony in Moscow, Russia, in November, 2021. Rogozin has shared a photograph of a Russian rocket phase with a 'Z' image painted on the aspect—an emblem synonymous with Russia's invasion of Ukraine.Mikhail Svetlov/Getty

Rogozin is a staunch supporter of Putin's regime and of the continuing invasion of Ukraine. Underneath his management, Roscosmos has grow to be more and more solitary, having dropped cooperation with different nations—together with a halt of rocket engine gross sales to the U.S.

The Angara A1.2 rocket tweeted by Rogozin is a part of the broader Angara rocket household—a sequence of area launch autos being developed by Russia, meant to switch getting old area expertise and modernize the nation's rocket fleet.

One other Angara mannequin, the Angara A5, was launched on December 27 final yr. The launcher reached low Earth orbit however was unable to go as excessive as deliberate because of an upper-stage engine failure, in keeping with Area.com, citing media studies.