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Solar Sail Spacecraft Unlikely in Orbit - Source

Posted on: Thursday, 23 June 2005, 00:00 CDT

MOSCOW. June 22 (Interfax) - Specialists from the Russian space monitoring service, a structural division of the Russian Space Forces, said they were unable to locate a solar sail spacecraft in orbit on Wednesday morning.

The solar sail spacecraft, which was launched aboard a converted Volna ballistic rocket from a Northern Fleet strategic submarine, has likely been lost, a source with Russian space circles told Interfax on Wednesday.

"According to telemetric data available now, we can be almost 100% sure that the satellite has unfortunately been lost," the source said, commenting on media reports that U.S. space tracking systems located a signal from the solar sail spacecraft.

The source suggested that the U.S. specialists probably mistook "some noises" for signals from the satellite.

The launch was monitored by Navy telemetry services, the source said. "Specialists from Roskosmos [the Russian Space Agency], including those from the space mission control center in Korolyov, have been engaged in analyzing the data received," he said.

"There are a lot of mysterious things" in the telemetric data provided by the military, he said.

CNN reported on Wednesday citing mission experts at the Planetary Society in California as saying that "Cosmos 1, the first solar sail- powered spacecraft, appears to be 'alive' and sending signals to tracking stations but could be in a lower orbit than planned."

"Telemetry data received by three tracking stations in the Pacific Ocean, Russia and the Czech Republic seemed to show that Cosmos 1 made it into orbit," CNN said, referring to the mission staff.

The spacecraft was launched from a nuclear submarine of the Dolphin type, or Delta IV by NATO classification, at 11:46 p.m. Moscow time on Tuesday.

A source with Russian space circles earlier told Interfax that the engines of the first stage of the rocket unexpectedly stopped after the launch, and the solar sail spacecraft did not reach its orbit at the pre-determined time.

Source: Daily News Bulletin; Moscow - English

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