

Russian space freighter lost - ColinWright
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14653371?

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ugh
Am I right when I say that this is a pretty huge coincidence? As far as I can
see Soyuz rockets almost never fail and Proton rockets only fail from time to
time.

Excluding this incident, Soyuz rockets had one partial and one complete
failure during the last decade (and more than 115 flights during that time).
The variant that is now used exclusively for manned flights had 33 flights and
no failures. Soyuz-U – the variant used for this flight – seems to be the real
troublemaker. It’s responsible for the only other complete failure during this
decade.

Proton had more than ninety launches in that decade and five failures.

Those Russian rockets are very mature and usually don’t fail.

~~~
iwwr
Two human crew return missions from the ISS were also partial failures.

<http://www.astronautix.com/articles/thespace.htm> (the bottom 2 entries)

~~~
RomP
those are space ship failures, not rockets. the current failure is one of a
rocket (delivery vehicle).

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anigbrowl
_This is the second Russian rocket failure in a week. On 18 August, a Proton
vehicle put a telecommunications satellite in the wrong orbit. In December,
another Proton failure resulted in top Russian space agency officials losing
their jobs._

Here's hoping that SpaceX can fill the gap - they're due to do the first
delivery in November: <http://www.spacex.com/updates.php>

~~~
Freakoi
Spacecraft programs run on science, not hope.

It is preposterous to think they will replace NASA on any level. It's amateur
hour now.

~~~
ugh
Huh? It looks like SpaceX might be able to supply the ISS with cargo very
soon. If that works people will follow not to long after that.

Sure, they are paid by NASA to do that but currently NASA is completely unable
to supply the ISS with anything.

NASA is awesome at putting together science missions. SpaceX (currently)
doesn’t want to do that, you can’t even compare the two in that respect. But
what’s so bad about launching all your stuff with rockets from a private
company?

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TeMPOraL
<http://www.spaceflightnow.com/station/exp28/110824prog44p/> \-- another take
on the topic.

"Russian space agency says a problem with the upper stage propulsion system
caused a premature shutdown and the vehicle's catastrophic failure."

I love the euphemisms that space industry uses, when they mean "the rocket
exploded" (or, in this case, turned back and fallen). The most epic one is
"lithobraking" :).

Also, sad news.

~~~
burgerbrain
"Vanguard rocket undergoing _rapid unplanned disassembly_ shortly after launch
at Cape Canaveral "

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanguard_(rocket)>

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iwwr
They also lost 3 navsats (Glonass) in December last year

[http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-russia-satellites-
orbit....](http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-russia-satellites-orbit.html)

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joeyh
Why leave out "Progress" from the title of the article here?

(I noticed NPR doing the same thing on the radio which told me that some
Russian spaceship without, apparently, a name, was lost. Sort of as if, since
it's Russian, we shouldn't care about the details.)

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Freakoi
Thank you President Obama for saving the space shuttle program!

After all, it would be idiotic to trust another country with something as
important as manned space exploration.

It is equally idiotic to cancel a spaceship program until another one is in
the air. What a relief!

~~~
smithian
This has nothing to do with Obama. STS was planned for decommission in the
Bush era. Blaming it on Obama is reactionary tripe.

Also, Soyuz is STILL the most reliable launch system on the planet after Delta
II, and the most reliable manned system.

In addition this was a failure of a Soyuz-U, not a Soyuz-FG which is used for
crew rotation. The QA process on the two is quite different, and it appears
(still too early to tell, but it is likely) that this error was a QA failure.

Shuttle needed to be retired to move forward with anything else, as the
program costs were too high to realistically move forward with any other
development work with the current NASA budget.

~~~
arethuza
Soyuz is so good that Arianespace will be launching it from their Guiana Space
Center starting later this year:

[http://www.arianespace.com/launch-services-soyuz/soyuz-
intro...](http://www.arianespace.com/launch-services-soyuz/soyuz-
introduction.asp)

This is in addition to the existing Ariane 5 heavy launcher and the new Vega
launcher:

[http://www.arianespace.com/launch-services/launch-
services-o...](http://www.arianespace.com/launch-services/launch-services-
overview.asp)

