The Tide Is Low
// A solar sail entered the open ocean
A trend
The launching of Kosmos-1 satellite with a solar sail spacecraft from K-496 Borisoglebovsk nuclear submarine of the Russian Northern fleet failed in the Barents Sea on Tuesday night. There was a spontaneous engine shutdown of the first stage of Volna booster, the booster falling with the satellite in the ocean off New Zealand. This is the second incident of this kind in a row. Earlier Tuesday, Molniya-M spacecraft carrying Molniya-3K military satellite fell after the launching from the Plesetsk space center
Volna [in Russian “tide”] booster is a conversion type of RSM-50 nuclear missile developed by the Makeev Design Bureau and used by the Russian Navy. The spacecraft carrying Kosmos-1 satellite constructed in the Lavochkin Research and Production centre by order of the Planetary Society (the USA) was launched from K-496 Borisolebsk nuclear submarine of the Russian Northern Fleet in the Barents Sea from underwater at 23:46 Moscow time, Tuesday. 83 seconds after the launching there happened a spontaneous engine failure of the first stage, the rocket with the satellite falling in the ocean off New Zealand. Volna, unlike the military RSM-50, was not equipped with self-destruct system.
This is the second attempt to launch Kosmos-1 satellite carrying a space sail that was supposed to be used to move on the orbit driven by the “solar wind”. First they tried to launch it July 2001 from Borisoglebsk strategic nuclear submarine but failed. That time Volna fully accomplished the program of the placing the satellite in orbit but the satellite did not get detached from the rocket falling with its last stage on the Kura range (Kamchatka). The work on the project did not terminate, though. It took four years for the creation and ground tests of s new spacecraft. It was constructed in the Lavochkin Research and Production centre and cost over $2 million.
Yesterday’s failure was the second space incident in a row in Russia. Tuesday, Molniya-M booster with military communication satellite Molniya-3M launched from the Plesetsk center fell in Tyumen Region. Yet, Russian Federal Space Agency chief Anatoly Perminov said these failures will not influence commercial launchings. Mr. Perminov expressed his regret over the incidents stressing the fact that “the two starts were carried out by the Defense Ministry, the Russian Space Agency was in charge neither of any of the launchings two, nor of the operations connected with them, as it deals with the launchings of civil spacecrafts”. However, he passed over in silence the fact that Molniya-M and Volna had been launched by the enterprises in Samara and Miass (Chelyabinsk Region), subordinate to the space agency.
Russian Navy Commander Adm. Vladimir Kuroedov was quick to escape the blame as well. Commenting on the incident with the launching of Kosmos-1 he told Interfax-AVN news agency that “the booster was launched from the strategic submarine of the Northern Fleet in a normal mode”. He thinks the evidence of this is the fact that “there were no problems when the rocket was launched from the submarine, its crew are safe and sound”. The commander Kuroedov failed to mention, though, that the launching was carried out in line with the overhaul-period renewal plan of RSM-50 nuclear missiles, installed with nine nuclear submarines of 667BDR project. That is why “the launching of Volna was the fulfillment of the military mission one more time disrupted by the Navy”, a source in the Defense Ministry told Kommersant.
Similar incidents have occurred in the Northern Fleet before. On February 17, 2004, Novomoskovsk nuclear submarine failed to carry out a combat-exercise launch of Sineva RSM-54 missile during Security 2004 strategic command-post exercise visited by Vladimir Putin. Kuroedov explained then that no one had planned real launchings, the firings were to be “simulation”. Another submarine, Karelia, failed to carry out a start the following day. The first Sineva missile launched from it deflected and was destructed by the system of emergency undermining at the 98th second.
Lost Rocket Debris Found
The wreckage of the Molniya-M booster that fell after the launch from the Plesetsk space center last Tuesday was discovered in the Uvat district of Tyumen Region. Sources in Tyumenneftegas (TNK-BP’s subsidiary) reported to Kommersant that the wreckage was found in the area of the Kalchinsky oil field. Their numbers of the components were reported to the headquarters of the Space Forces in Moscow where experts are define if they belong to the fallen Molniya-M. Meanwhile, the emergency commission headed by the deputy commander of the Space Forces Lieutenant General Oleg Gromonov terminated its work in Plesetsk, according to the information of Kommersant , and is to fly to Samara today where it will continue the investigation at CSKB Progress design bureau of the causes of the failure.
Ivan Safronov; Larisa Rychkova, Tyumen
All the Article in Russian as of June 23, 2005
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