Satellite News

Experts have come up with a preliminary version of what may have caused the emergency shutdown of a Dnepr rocket engine and the subsequent crash of the launcher. Meanwhile, the rocket’s second and upper stage as well as the satellites it carried have been found.

The Governor of Kazakhstan’s Kzylorda Region, Ikram Adyrbekov, estimates the environmental damage caused by the crash of a Dnepr rocket in the region last July at EUR292 million/US$333 million. Roskomos in reply said it would be premature to put a figure on the damage.

The investigation into the crash of a Dnepr rocket on 26 July increasingly seems to focus on the rocket’s flight control system, according to Itar-Tass.

Russia’s Roskosmos space agency says it will compensate Kazakhstan for any possible environmental damages caused by the recent Dnepr crash. The extent of the damage is still unclear, and there are contradicting reports as usual.

The committee set up to look into the failed mission of GSLV-F02 was making satisfactory progress and would come out with its findings within a month, according to ISRO Chairman G Madhavan Nair.

A manufacturing defect is said to have caused the Ukrainian-Russian Dnepr launch vehicle carrying 18 satellites to crash shortly after lift-off from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, on 26 July. In related news, the rocket’s fuel did not burn up before or as it impacted, as Russian officials had earlier claimed.

The failed Dnepr rocket launched on 26 July has been found in an uninhabitated area 150 kilometers off the launch pad at the Baikonur cosmodrome.

The crash of the Dnepr launch vehicle shortly after lift-off from Baikonur yesterday was likely caused by a failure in the first stage, according to Igor Panarin, spokesman for the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roskosmos).