We should look to start a thread covering the Russian failures debate, while stressing everyone's gone through a bad period (been seeing those historical threads about those Titan failures in a row, etc.)A central thread will allow the specific threads to stay specific. So if someone wants to set that up, probably in the Russian section as our Russian friends will have good input.
This thread reminded me. How has Nauka been doing lately?
The Briz-M did not fail. It was the third stage of the Proton booster and I'm not sure it was the verniers (that was the failure last year). The Briz-M is the fourth stage.
Quote from: kevin-rf on 05/17/2015 11:23 amBefore everyone jumps on the Proton is unreliable, time for Angara 5 bandwagon. Doesn't the Angara 5 also use the Briz M? Briz M which has been implicated in more than it's fair share of recent failures.And Angara has just performed 2 flights, so it is a little bit early to speak about Angara's reliability.If Proton's problems come from problems inside the organisation (quality control, underpayment, over-working, loss of experienced workers, etc.), it is likely, that these problems might as well affect Angara in the same way.
Before everyone jumps on the Proton is unreliable, time for Angara 5 bandwagon. Doesn't the Angara 5 also use the Briz M? Briz M which has been implicated in more than it's fair share of recent failures.
Interfax stated that one of the 11D458 vernier engines was a possible cause here based on early telemetry data: http://www.interfax.ru/world/442020
May also include Progress failing to boost ISS last Friday.
My google fu apparently isn't up to the task. Has a Proton second stage (8S811K) ever failed during ascent?
I think this launch failure will have grave consequences for ILS / commerical launches on Proton and Soyuz.The last commercial Proton launch contract I know is Eutelsat 9B 16 months ago (assuming that Gazprom Yamal-601 had not option )The failure rate for Soyuz/R-7 is 4.5% since 2010. For Proton it is 15% since 2010! This is bad even compared with other Russian launchers. Majority of failures mentioned above were on non-commercial flights. Major western launchers (Ariane V, Atlas V, F9, Delta 4) have almost flawless flight record in the same period. But SatMex-1 launch was insured for $390 million, if I remember correctly. That means that insurance rates for any Russian launches (and especially Proton) will have to be significantly higher. For example, 15% of $390 million equals $58.5 million. Assuming commercial price of Proton of $85 million, that almost covers the difference cost for Ariane V upper slot, or having a dedicated F9 rocket. So probably commercial contracts on Proton are going to the history. Proton lost its low-cost advantage (to SpaceX), and is by far the most unreliable rocket around (which must hike up insurance rates a lot). Its only advantage is quicker availability. Last commercial contract I know of (Eutelsat 9B) was signed 16 months ago for launch in 2015. That leaves Turksat 4B, Yamal 601, Eutelsat 9B, Inmarsat 5 F3 in the pipeline and nothing else.
Quote from: Steven Pietrobon on 05/18/2015 04:44 amThe Briz-M did not fail. It was the third stage of the Proton booster and I'm not sure it was the verniers (that was the failure last year). The Briz-M is the fourth stage.Interfax stated that one of the 11D458 vernier engines was a possible cause here based on early telemetry data: http://www.interfax.ru/world/442020
@parabolicarc has a piece on the series of Russian launch failures over the last 6 years: http://www.parabolicarc.com/2015/05/16/years-failure-haunt-russian-space-program/There's a handy table listing the failures, attached for convenience.
Quote from: FutureSpaceTourist on 05/18/2015 07:29 am@parabolicarc has a piece on the series of Russian launch failures over the last 6 years: http://www.parabolicarc.com/2015/05/16/years-failure-haunt-russian-space-program/There's a handy table listing the failures, attached for convenience.That is a scary list... 16 failures in six years (and accelerating if anything) across four lines of launchers, including those that had incredibly long launch histories. Isolated technical flaw it is not; broad, systemic weakness is only explanation. It will be difficult to prove that it doesn't touch all programs.Time to stop flying crew?
Quote from: dkovacic on 05/18/2015 11:44 amI think this launch failure will have grave consequences for ILS / commerical launches on Proton and Soyuz.The last commercial Proton launch contract I know is Eutelsat 9B 16 months ago (assuming that Gazprom Yamal-601 had not option )The failure rate for Soyuz/R-7 is 4.5% since 2010. For Proton it is 15% since 2010! This is bad even compared with other Russian launchers. Majority of failures mentioned above were on non-commercial flights. Major western launchers (Ariane V, Atlas V, F9, Delta 4) have almost flawless flight record in the same period. But SatMex-1 launch was insured for $390 million, if I remember correctly. That means that insurance rates for any Russian launches (and especially Proton) will have to be significantly higher. For example, 15% of $390 million equals $58.5 million. Assuming commercial price of Proton of $85 million, that almost covers the difference cost for Ariane V upper slot, or having a dedicated F9 rocket. So probably commercial contracts on Proton are going to the history. Proton lost its low-cost advantage (to SpaceX), and is by far the most unreliable rocket around (which must hike up insurance rates a lot). Its only advantage is quicker availability. Last commercial contract I know of (Eutelsat 9B) was signed 16 months ago for launch in 2015. That leaves Turksat 4B, Yamal 601, Eutelsat 9B, Inmarsat 5 F3 in the pipeline and nothing else.Morelos 3 and Centenario go to inclined orbits (around 15 deg I believe). Ironically, Ariane 5 5deg of inclination would have needed a plane change on the other direction. This is why they went with Proton-M/Briz-M and Atlas V. Bicenternario (the GEO one), did in fact, flew on Araine 5.The Mexican government appears not to quite understand the schedule fluidity of the space business, you'd be quite surprised to see the level of lawsuit threat that went to Ariane 5 because they were a couple of months late to launch. I will take a guess and say that if they order a replacement (which they should), then they will go with either Atlas V or Falcon 9/FH.But that's why Proton-M got the Centenario contract, the Mexicans were spreading their risk and needed an inclined orbit. SpaceX and Arianespace are booked solid to 2017/8, so, this failure on Proton might actually allow Atlas V or even H-2A to win a few other launches.I do see a vicious cycle on Proton, little to no ILS launches means less economies of scale, less practice for the team, less commercial pressure to perform, and until they prove themselves back, I don't expect anything but Russian and allies payloads. And that means a lot less revenue for Krunischev. Which means more human resourses drainage, etc.I do see an opportunity for Angara, but they lack a launch pad at Voistochny. And given the speed of advance of the Soyuz pad, they'll be lucky to get them by 2020. Unless they can make some arrangement with Brazil for Angara, I see the bulk of commercial coming back to the West for the next five to seven years.
I don't believe that an 8.39% failure rate overall or a 3.62% failure rate on Soyuz are acceptable for crew.
Excellent and thank you for this. Puts it into better perspective. If anyone knows of other failures/issues that may belong on here please feel free to Photoshop them on.
Any idea if there are any spare Atlas V cores that are not slated for a mission already? Otherwise that might be delta winning those. The alternative is SpaceX somehow ramps up core production to try and win extra contracts...but I don't think they would do that. Regarding Atlas V cores maybe Jim could answer that. Barring spare cores these contracts would have to wait for NGLSOtherwise I agree, it seems to me Roscosmos needs to conduct an overhaul of the supply chain/quality control.
Quote from: FutureSpaceTourist on 05/18/2015 07:29 am@parabolicarc has a piece on the series of Russian launch failures over the last 6 years: http://www.parabolicarc.com/2015/05/16/years-failure-haunt-russian-space-program/There's a handy table listing the failures, attached for convenience.Excellent and thank you for this. Puts it into better perspective. If anyone knows of other failures/issues that may belong on here please feel free to Photoshop them on.
Yes, for the Nth time.... Proton-M is a FOUR stage rocket. 3 stages plus Briz-M.And while there is no direct hardware link between A) proton failures, B) Soyuz failures, and C) spacecraft failures - there does seem to be a trend of declining quality control in Russian aerospace.
Quote from: FinalFrontier on 05/18/2015 05:05 pmAny idea if there are any spare Atlas V cores that are not slated for a mission already? Otherwise that might be delta winning those. The alternative is SpaceX somehow ramps up core production to try and win extra contracts...but I don't think they would do that. Regarding Atlas V cores maybe Jim could answer that. Barring spare cores these contracts would have to wait for NGLSOtherwise I agree, it seems to me Roscosmos needs to conduct an overhaul of the supply chain/quality control.I don't believe that LV will be the long pole. Mexican government has to get the insurance payment, order a new satellite, and it has to be built. If they had contingency plans (which I assume they did, since this was a military payload), they might order the S/C in six months, plus another 36 (really minimum) for delivery, you are talking about a 2019 launch, which should be a lot easier on the manifest since it coincides with a dip on DoD launches.
Quote from: baldusi on 05/18/2015 05:12 pmQuote from: FinalFrontier on 05/18/2015 05:05 pmAny idea if there are any spare Atlas V cores that are not slated for a mission already? Otherwise that might be delta winning those. The alternative is SpaceX somehow ramps up core production to try and win extra contracts...but I don't think they would do that. Regarding Atlas V cores maybe Jim could answer that. Barring spare cores these contracts would have to wait for NGLSOtherwise I agree, it seems to me Roscosmos needs to conduct an overhaul of the supply chain/quality control.I don't believe that LV will be the long pole. Mexican government has to get the insurance payment, order a new satellite, and it has to be built. If they had contingency plans (which I assume they did, since this was a military payload), they might order the S/C in six months, plus another 36 (really minimum) for delivery, you are talking about a 2019 launch, which should be a lot easier on the manifest since it coincides with a dip on DoD launches.They may have a very similar SkyTerra-2 satellite in storage from the bankrupt LightSquared. While there is conflicting info on it, I know that 4 total satellites were built, and that there was talk when the Mexsat contract was signed of re-purposing SkyTerra-2, it didn't happen. If it did exist, it would still require work, but could most likely be turned in about 6 months.
Yes, for the Nth time.... Proton-M is a FOUR stage rocket. 3 stages plus Briz-M.
Quote from: Lars-J on 05/18/2015 07:54 pmYes, for the Nth time.... Proton-M is a FOUR stage rocket. 3 stages plus Briz-M.that is not true...there are proton-m launches with different upper stages - eg. block-dm (2 and/or 3)... there are even planned proton-m launches without any upper stage (in the 3 stage config)
It doesn't really affect Lars' point that there are alternate configurations that don't use a Briz-M stage -- he was responding to someone who thought the Briz-M was the third stage, which, I believe, is never the case with Proton-M.
I wonder how much of an incentive he has to reshuffle things at Khrunichev. If Khrunichev keeps pushing out failed launches, there won't be any more launch money for people to siphon off.
Quote from: The Amazing Catstronaut on 05/19/2015 08:52 amI wonder how much of an incentive he has to reshuffle things at Khrunichev. If Khrunichev keeps pushing out failed launches, there won't be any more launch money for people to siphon off.The problem is that the first instinct seems always to be to scapegoat and I don't think that their system allows for them to identify and remedy true root causes that are not immediately obvious. They can identify and patch obvious production issues and individual personnel lapses very well. However, the deeper cultural malaise and lack of check-points to identify faults during the production process may literally be something that it is impossible for what is essentially a politically-controlled and -managed operation to recognise and remedy.
Quote from: MechE31 on 05/19/2015 01:04 amQuote from: baldusi on 05/18/2015 05:12 pmQuote from: FinalFrontier on 05/18/2015 05:05 pmAny idea if there are any spare Atlas V cores that are not slated for a mission already? Otherwise that might be delta winning those. The alternative is SpaceX somehow ramps up core production to try and win extra contracts...but I don't think they would do that. Regarding Atlas V cores maybe Jim could answer that. Barring spare cores these contracts would have to wait for NGLSOtherwise I agree, it seems to me Roscosmos needs to conduct an overhaul of the supply chain/quality control.I don't believe that LV will be the long pole. Mexican government has to get the insurance payment, order a new satellite, and it has to be built. If they had contingency plans (which I assume they did, since this was a military payload), they might order the S/C in six months, plus another 36 (really minimum) for delivery, you are talking about a 2019 launch, which should be a lot easier on the manifest since it coincides with a dip on DoD launches.They may have a very similar SkyTerra-2 satellite in storage from the bankrupt LightSquared. While there is conflicting info on it, I know that 4 total satellites were built, and that there was talk when the Mexsat contract was signed of re-purposing SkyTerra-2, it didn't happen. If it did exist, it would still require work, but could most likely be turned in about 6 months.If they were willing to wait for a new satellite the first time around when re-purposing SkyTerra-2 was an option, I doubt they would go with a re-purposed SkyTerra-2 this time around. They'd have to have some kind of time-critical need that was more pressing now than it was back when they started to make them make a different decision, and I doubt that's the case.
On the failure press conference the Secretary of Communications and Boeing Space Systems president stated that the replacement would take 36 to 38 months. But I'm pretty sure it won't fly on a Proton-M. So I don't believe that it matters much further discussion in this particular thread.
Quote from: The Amazing Catstronaut on 05/19/2015 08:52 amI wonder how much of an incentive he has to reshuffle things at Khrunichev. If Khrunichev keeps pushing out failed launches, there won't be any more launch money for people to siphon off.The problem is that the first instinct seems always to be to scapegoat and I don't think that their system allows for them to identify and remedy true root causes that are not immediately obvious. They can identify and patch obvious production issues and individual personnel lapses very well. However, the deeper cultural malaise and lack of check-points to identify faults during the production process may literally be something that it is impossible for what is essentially a politically-controlled and -managed operation to recognize and remedy.
Root cause analysis is needed as several have stated.Is this even possible in the Russian political climate where untruth at the highest levels is the National policy? How can an honest investigation even be conducted?
Quote from: AncientU on 05/19/2015 02:44 pmRoot cause analysis is needed as several have stated.Is this even possible in the Russian political climate where untruth at the highest levels is the National policy? How can an honest investigation even be conducted?Let's be honest. If root cause is that budgets are 1/2 of what they should, what good it is if they can do nothing about it? I suspects that everybody knows it but there's no political will to solve it.
Speaking several days after the latest failures in the sector -- including the botched launch of a Proton rocket that led to the loss of a Mexican satellite -- Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said the industry was plagued by "morally decayed" officials and underpayed personnel.He reserved the most biting criticism for the Khrunichev space centre, which produces the Proton rockets.After the latest failure, investigators launched probes targeting the lab's ex-employees for allegedly falsifying documents and causing a loss of nine billion rubles ($180 million, 161 million euros), Rogozin said."With such high moral decay of its leadership, one should not be surprised at the product's poor quality," he said.He said the latest accident with the Proton rocket is identical to two other accidents in 1988 and 2014, which shows that the high-profile probes into them "did not find the real reason" for the malfunction.
I think the failure rate for Proton is fine.Perhaps starting to edge towards the stage where you would worry about your payload but is not this the point of cheap rockets that can launch huge payloads?Ask any of the customers if they would pay 100s of millions more for a guarantee. The answer is obviously no otherwise they'd be flying on Atlas/Delta.
I think this launch failure will have grave consequences for ILS / commerical launches on Proton and Soyuz.The last commercial Proton launch contract I know is Eutelsat 9B 16 months ago... <snip>So probably commercial contracts on Proton are going to the (be) history. Proton lost its low-cost advantage (to SpaceX), and is by far the most unreliable rocket around (which must hike up insurance rates a lot). Its only advantage is quicker availability. Last commercial contract I know of (Eutelsat 9B) was signed 16 months ago for launch in 2015. That leaves Turksat 4B, Yamal 601, Eutelsat 9B, Inmarsat 5 F3 in the pipeline and nothing else.
The biggest issue is near term there doesn't seem to be many launch options available.
Pardon me, but shouldn't "Krunichev" be spelt "Khrunichev"?
On Russian forums the main cause of the problems is considered unprofessional management
Quote from: MaxBioHazard on 05/20/2015 05:09 pmOn Russian forums the main cause of the problems is considered unprofessional managementRejecting every problems' fault on management is a common practice in France. It seems we have a common point with Russia !
Quote from: Nicolas PILLET on 05/20/2015 07:14 pmQuote from: MaxBioHazard on 05/20/2015 05:09 pmOn Russian forums the main cause of the problems is considered unprofessional managementRejecting every problems' fault on management is a common practice in France. It seems we have a common point with Russia !Let's remember that well educated Russians only spoke in French until the Napoleonic wars. The Russian culture was heavily influenced by the French. Even War and Peace was written (originally) in both languages.
http://tass.ru/en/russia/796547The results of the work of the commission investigating the causes of the Proton-M carrier rocket crash that occurred on May 16 will be reported to the government on Friday, May 29, a Russian space and industry source told TASS on Monday."The commission will complete its work and report the results to the Russian government on May 29," the source said.According to him, the emergencies commission working at the Khrunichev Centre (Proton manufacturer) has exposed a number of violations in the carrier rocket production. "This is, undoubtedly, a human error. The fault occurred in the rocket manufacturing process," he said.