Russian Soyuz Foton-M Satellite fails to respond to commands

Soyuz engineers at Progress were trying to save a research satellite after it failed to respond to commands, which has left it in an improper orbit, Russian news agencies said.

The Foton-M satellite was launched on July 19 on a two-month mission to study the effect of weightlessness on plants and insects.

The satellite carries containers with living organisms, including five geckos, fruit flies and fungi, which are supposed to be jettisoned after two months in orbit and land in Russia.

There is no update on the status of the living cargo, since the containers are not designed to broadcast any telemetry while in space.

The mishap is the latest in series of setbacks that has plagued Russia's once-famed space programme.

Containers with biological experiment equipment being loaded into the Foton-M satellite. 

Photo by the Institute for Biomedical Problems. 

Russian Rocket launch fails at Kapustin Yar - Weather Satellite payload

A weather rocket launched from Russia's Kapustin Yar launching field crashed in Kazakhstan's western region, according to government reports.

The incident happened early in the morning on March 27, between 1 and 2 a.m., a government source said.

The rocket fell less than one kilometer away from a local village named Shungai with no casualties reported.

According to reports from Kapustin Yar, it was an accident caused by a propulsion system failure, which kept the rocket from reaching its designated destination.

Meanwhile, Kazakhstan's Defense Ministry said it will suspend all Russian missile experiments on leased testing fields in Kazakhstan until the cause of the crash is identified, according to the ministry's website.

"The Ministry of Defense of Kazakhstan has suspended Russia's testing on the leased military grounds in Kazakhstan until the cause of the accident is found," the press office of the Defense Ministry said on Friday.

Kazakhstan's Environmental Regulation and Control Department said soil and air samples will be collected from the crash site to assess the environmental impact.

Kapustin Yar is known to be a launch site for smaller space vehicles. It is also one of Russia's first missile test ranges. During Soviet time a number of intermediate and short range missile projects were tested there.

Progress 51 Mission to ISS: Spaceship Antenna Fails to Deploy

A Russian Soyuz-U booster carrying Progress spacecraft, seen at the Russian leased Kazakhstan Baikonur cosmodrome.

A unmanned Progress M-19M spaceship racing to the ISS with 2.5 tonnes of cargo on board failed Wednesday to deploy a key antenna that helps it dock with the orbiting lab in the latest hitch in Russia's space programme.

"There was a problem with one of the antennae in the Kurs (Navigation) system," Vitaly Lopota of the Energia space corporation the designs Russian spacecraft told the Interfax news agency.

The US space agency NASA said in a tweet: "Once in orbit, an antenna used as a navigational aid on the Progress did not deploy. Russian ground controllers are assessing a fix."

But Lopota stressed that the Progress cargo ship that was launched earlier Wednesday from the Baikonur space station in Kazakhstan could still dock to the International Space Station on Friday as planned.

"Even if the antenna fails to deploy, we will still be able to get to within 200 metres (of the ISS) and perform an automatic docking," the Energia president said.

An unnamed source at Mission Control outside Moscow told news agencies that space officials were not particularly worried about the latest mishap to affect Russia's once-vaunted space programme.

"Such incidents have happened before. Nobody is especially excited about this," said the Mission Control official.

"We will try to get the antenna open when (the Progress) makes its next orbit."

Russia's programme is being watched closely by other space powers because it remains the only nation capable of transporting humans to the International Space Station following the 2011 retirement of the US shuttle programme.

But the Roscosmos space agency has suffered through a string of problems in recent years that include the August 2011 explosion after lift-off of a Soyuz rocket carrying another unmanned Progress cargo craft.

Russian Progress Module Fails to Dock with ISS

A wide-angle view from the Progress 38 spacecraft showing the International Space Station as a point of light receding in the distance after an aborted docking attempt.

(Credit: NASA TV, William Harwood/CNET)

The automated approach of an unmanned Russian Progress supply ship to the International Space Station was aborted Friday when telemetry between the spacecraft and the Russian command module was lost during final approach.

The Progress 38 cargo ship flew safely past the lab complex and the station's six-member crew was not in any apparent danger. But Russian flight controllers were unable to immediately resolve the problem.

Amid ongoing troubleshooting, the Russians plan to carry out two Progress rocket firings overnight Friday and one on Saturday, setting up a second docking attempt around 12:17 p.m. EDT Sunday. But that assumes engineers identify and resolve the problem that derailed Friday's docking or mission managers get comfortable with making a second try in the absence of a firm fix.

The preferred option, a NASA official said, is to attempt another automated approach using the Russian KURS navigation system that malfunctioned Friday. If that doesn't work, engineers could attempt to remotely maneuver the Progress close enough to the space station for commander Alexander Skvortsov to take over manual control using a different system.

For the manual TORU system to work properly, however, the Progress must be within about six-tenths of a mile of the station. It never got that close during Friday's approach.

Progress 38, loaded with 1,918 pounds of propellant, 110 pounds of oxygen, 220 pounds of water, and 2,667 pounds of experiment equipment, spare parts, and other supplies, was launched Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The spacecraft was in the final stages of an automated approach to the Zvezda command module's aft port Friday when the KURS communications gear in the station lost lock on the approaching Progress. Docking had been targeted for 12:58 p.m., but instead the Progress flew past the International Space Station and pulled ahead.

"It's rotating slowly," Skvortsov radioed at one point. "We see the vehicle and it keeps sliding behind and moving toward the front part of the station."

"OK, copy," a Russian flight controller replied.

"It's moving slowly and I think the range is increasing," Skvortsov said.

A few moments later, he reported: "It's drifting away from us, it's rotating and also it's moving away from us. We are moving with service module forward and it's moving in the same direction but it's going farther and farther away from us."

"OK, copy."

About an hour after the problem cropped up, Russian managers told the crew to stand down for the day.

"We are not going to do the docking today," Russian flight controllers called up shortly after 1:30 p.m. "All activities for the Progress have been deleted for right now. When you are going to have your lunch, please be available for communication if we need to call you."

NASA mission control commentator Rob Navias said engineers did not immediately understand what might have gone wrong.

"They're in the process of evaluating what may have caused a loss of telemetry between the Progress 38 cargo ship and the Zvezda service module about 30 minutes or so before its expected docking," he said.

"That exchange of data between the radio beacons on the active side of the system, which is the Progress, and the passive side of the system, which is the Zvezda in this case, provides the distance between the two vehicles and the rate of closure between the approaching vehicle and the docking target so the computers can be updated on the Progress itself for its final approach for a linkup at a rate of about one tenth of a meter per second.

"In this case, that telemetry link was lost for unexplained reasons," Navias said. "The Progress aborted its automated rendezvous and flew a safe distance past the International Space Station and now is maintaining an opening rate."

The last confirmed distance call indicated the Progress was nearly four miles ahead of the station and Navias said "the crew was never in any danger."

RSCCs Express AM1 Fails in Orbit

RSCCs Express AM1 Fails in Orbit

Russian Satellite Communications Co. (RSCC) announced May 17 that its Express-AM1 telecommunications satellite had failed in orbit, apparently following a shutdown of its attitude-control system.

Moscow-based RSCC said the problem first surfaced April 24. Express-AM1, built by ISS Reshetnev of Krasnoyarsk, Russia, with a payload provided by NEC Toshiba Space Systems, was launched in October 2004 and designed to operate for 10-12 years.

Express-AM1 was operated in geostationary orbit at 40 degrees east longitude and carries nine C-band and 18 Ku-band transponders for domestic Russian television and Internet service. It also carries one L-band transponder for mobile communications links.

RSCC did not immediately respond to questions about whether the satellite will be moved into a “graveyard” orbit several hundred kilometers above the geostationary arc, which is roughly 36,000 kilometers in altitude above the equator.