Launch News (FAILURE) Progress M-12M, Soyuz-U, August 24, 2011

[astrosammy]

Holy sh... How would a Soyuz react in such a situation? Would a seperation of the descent module be possible?

EDIT: Well, I guess that has been answered above.

 

[Cosmic Penguin]

Thank God it wasn't a manned flight.

If it were a manned flight, it might have likely followed Soyuz 18-1 scenario.

It would have been a rough landing in the Altai Mountains though, and do remember there is a ~1% chance that the launch abort system can fail.

P.S. I think I cannot forgive myself for saying this a week ago:

And they says that epic fails comes in three.... this video might be the third one... :rofl:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EVCDiQTfYA

This must have angered the PROBE so much that it decided that the next orbital launch will be a failure too. Please, forgive my bad humor! Forgive my sins! :facepalm:

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

upd: Head of Choysky district said in his interview that explosion from the falling rocket was much louder than usual, it shuddered glasses in windows at 100 km away from the site.

Do you have a link for that, ST? Thanks.

 

[SiberianTiger]

Do you have a link for that, ST? Thanks.

Yep. But in Russian only.
http://txt.newsru.com/russia/24aug2011/progress_tajga.html

 

[astrosammy]

Do they have enough supplies until the next launch? Or could that be the end of more than 10 years of continous human presence in space for some weeks/months?

 

[Orbinaut Pete]

My latest NASASpaceflight article: Russia’s Progress M-12M launches toward ISS – fails to achieve orbit.

 

[N_Molson]

A R-7 failure. :blink: Possibly the worst thing that could happen now. :shifty:

the problem isn't the supplies its the that the Soyuz carries both the manned and unmanned vehicles.

Exactly. Apart the "Long March" rocket, it's the only man-rated launcher. The only one. And now it is grounded. This is dramatic. :facepalm:

 

[diogom]

Do they have enough supplies until the next launch? Or could that be the end of more than 10 years of continous human presence in space for some weeks/months?

They have emergency supplies stored for these situations.
Look in here: http://www.spaceflightnow.com/statio...110824prog44p/

 

[garyw]

They have enough supplies for several months and there is always an option of reducing the crew from 6 to 3 to save up supplies. the problem isn't the supplies its the that the Soyuz carries both the manned and unmanned vehicles.

Soyuz has now been grounded until the cause can found. This means no more progress, no crew rotation. They had better find the root cause quickly.

 

[agentgonzo]

SpaceX must be watching avidly. This gives even more incentive to get Dragon docked to the ISS with supplies.

I'm assuming that the upcoming Dragon-->ISS mission will take supplies. I see no reason for it not to.

 

[SiberianTiger]

Second time in one week, it's Khrunichev's stuff that breaks:

http://www.khrunichev.ru/main.php?id=101

RD-0110 (11D55) Liquid-propellant rocket engine

Used as Stage 3 engine on Soyuz(manned flights)and Progress(cargo missions)to support Salyut and Mir space stations and currently the ISS program.

Complete with four steering nozzles, the four-chamber engine uses only one fuel pump and operates based on an "open" configuration.

Pvac = 298 KN (30.4MT-f)

t = 240s

Propellants: kerosene and LOX

 

[N_Molson]

SpaceX must be watching avidly. This gives even more incentive to get Dragon docked to the ISS with supplies.

I'm assuming that the upcoming Dragon-->ISS mission will take supplies. I see no reason for it not to.

Yes and no. The worst thing to do would be to rush programs that are still in developpement. That would undoubtly lead to more catastrophic failures.

Now, with the R-7/Soyuz grounded, the Chinese have the only man-rated launch system in the world.

 

[Notebook]

BBC has woke up:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14653371

RIA Novosti said the freighter could have come down in Russia's Altai region on the border with Mongolia and China. The news agency quoted a local official in the Gorni Altai region as saying a distant blast had been heard and that emergency services had been despatched to investiga

N.

 

[N_Molson]

On NASA news :

Communication With Progress 44 Lost After Launch

Mission Control Moscow reported that communication with the Progress 44 cargo craft was lost 5 minutes, 20 seconds after its launch at 9 a.m. EDT today. Preliminary data from the Russian Federal Space Agency indicate there was a problem with the propulsion system, and that the vehicle did not reach its desired orbit.

International Space Station Program Manager Michael Suffredini will hold a news conference on NASA Television at noon EDT.

Just after 11 a.m., Mission Control Moscow radioed a report to the crew on board the station:

"At 1300 (GMT), we lifted off, following 320 seconds of flight there was a failure in the upper stage of the launch vehicle. We lost comm(unications) after a while with the launch vehicle and we did not report stage separation," said Maxim Matuchen, the head of the Russian Mission Control Center.

"In the previous comm(unications) pass we attempted to contact the vehicle through every possible channel. Orbital monitoring telemetry and we have just finished our second comm(unications) pass where we invoked all of the communications facilities. We sent commands to activate the comm(unications) pass on board, unfortunately it failed."

"Understood," replied Expedition 28 Commander Andrey Borisenko.

"This is it for the moment, we'll try to figure out what has happened and what the cause was. I just wanted to keep you informed."

"Thank you for letting us know so quickly," Borisenko added. "Thank you from the entire crew."

Progress 44 launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome into a cloudless sky at 7 p.m. Kazakhstan time bound for the International Space Station and a docking on Friday. At the time of launch, the space station was flying 230 miles over Equatorial Guinea on the west coast of Africa. The spacecraft is carrying 2.9 tons of food, fuel and supplies for the space station.

 

[Cosmic Penguin]

Yes and no. The worst thing to do would be to rush programs that are still in developpement. That would undoubtly lead to more catastrophic failures.

Now, with the R-7/Soyuz grounded, the Chinese have the only man-rated launch system in the world.

I think even THAT is grounded today too, as the Long March 2F uses the same first and second stage engines as the failed Long March 2C (it has stretched first and second stages, has four liquid boosters, and is man-rated for use on manned launches). At least it won't be grounded for too long, as Chinese media reports that the launch of Tiangong-1 will only be delayed for about a week (to early September).

 

[Dive]

Ok, it begins. Russian cosmonautics degraded enough. The last launch from Baikonur was the Express satelite launch by Proton, and was failed too. Over 10 days ago.

UPD: Yesterday, the previous Progress ship undocked from the aft. docking port of Zvezda module. This means that ISS have no reboost ship now. But i think it's possible to use Zvezda engines, or, in dificult case, it's possible to redock another progress, which is currently docked to another port.

 

[garyw]

Some news from Mike Suffredini:

• Soyuz-FG (crew) and Soyuz-U (cargo) have similar third stage designs so this will have impact on 22 September crew launch
  
• We can go several months without a resupply vehicle if that becomes necessary
  
• We have a 40-50 days of contingency beyond normal crew stay time
  
• Eventually the Soyuz vehicle on orbit will 'time out' and have to come home
  
• If the anomaly is solved the Progress flight in October could fly sooner

 

[MattBaker]

I heard something of "heptil", some sort of fuel for the ISS, that was in the Progress and is highly poisonous, are there any information on that?

 

[T.Neo]

I've never heard of "heptil", but the propellant carried by Progress both for refueling Zvezda and for its own thrusters is hypergolic and toxic, and thus dangerous...

One would hope that these propellants have burnt up/dissipated enough not to cause much harm, but I wouldn't pick any piece of debris up. Similar situation occured after the breakup of Columbia.

 

[Scruce]

News report on RussiaToday (RT):

(Includes a video of the launch!)