Screen Capture of Proton MexSat-1 Launch The Russian aerospace industry suffered a new failure overnight as another Proton booster, this one operating for U.S. marketer International Launch Services, failed to reach orbit. The failure occurred approximately one minute before the payload, with Briz-M upper stage still attached, was supposed to separate from the rocket’s 3rd […]
Roscosmos has reported that the stricken M-27M Progress resupply vessel reentered the Earth’s atmosphere overnight. The statement, which is on the agency’s website (in Russian), says that the craft “ceased to exist over the central Pacific Ocean, and that the results of an investigation will be presented no later than May 13th. Further reports in […]
Liftoff of Progress M-27-M / Image Credit Roscosmos A flurry of reports in Russia new media indicate that yesterday’s launch of the Progress M-27-M resupply freighter to the International Space Station has gone awry, and perhaps badly so. Liftoff took place aboard a Soyuz-2.1a booster from the Baikonour Cosmodome in Kazakhstan at 10:09 AM Moscow […]
Russia successfully launches the Angara booster on its first orbital flight. From the Russian news agency TASS: MOSCOW, December 23. /TASS/. A new Russian heavy rocket was successfully test-launched from the Plesetsk space center on Tuesday as planned at 08:57am Moscow time. The head unit has separated from the third stage of the Angara rocket, […]
Michal Gass, Former President and CEO of United Launch Alliance Following up on questions posed in a letter by U.S. Senator John McCain to the US Air Force chief of acquisitions, Reuters has been looking closer into the United Launch Alliance RD-180 issue, and the mysterious five person company RD-Amross, which serves as the Russian […]
One of the biggest questions to be answered by the International Space Station doesn’t involve mice, plants or 3-d printers. Instead it regards the Station itself, its lifespan and ultimate disposition. Currently funded through 2020 with agreement on the part of all the International Partners; the U.S., Russia, ESA, Japan and Canada, what comes after […]
Image Credit: Russian Space Agency The headlines (particularly those from Britain) focused on the prurient: Russia: SEXY LIZARDS which landed FROM SPACE are ALL Dead (The Register) Russia confirms death of five geckos on space sex mission (The Guardian) Sex geckos die in orbit on Russian space project (The BBC!) But what deserves a bit […]
It was something of a Black Friday for the launch industry yesterday. In addition to the SpaceX F9-R “explosion” in Texas, a bizarre story has emerged regarding an Arianespace launch which happened the same day. The launch, which took place aboard a Russian built commercial Soyuz out of French Guiana and under the Arianespace banner, […]
Russia’s long awaited Angara booster lifted off today on a suborbital test flight which carried with it the hopes of a revival in the Russian launch industry after years decades of reliance on Soviet era boosters. The Angara 1.2PP or ML (Maiden Launch) Integrated Launch Vehicle (ILV) lifted off from the far northern Plesetsk cosmodrome […]
Russia may soon need its own trampoline. Overnight, a Russian Proton-M booster lifted off from Baikonur carrying the Express AM4R communications satellite built by EADS Astrium. Like all too many Proton payloads in recent years, it did not reach the correct orbit, or in this case, any orbit at all. Instead it suffered a complete […]
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