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Russia Mozhayets satellite fails to detach from booster
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-10-28 20:34 The Russian satellite
Mozhayets-5 launched on Thursday from the Plesetsk spaceport failed to detach
from the third stage of the carrier rocket and has not sent signal back to
earth, the Itar-Tass news agency reported on Friday.
"According to the latest telemetric data, the Mozhayets has not detached from
the third stage of the Kosmos-3M carrier rocket and is currently rotating with
it on a near-earth orbit," an official of the northern cosmodrome of Russia was
quoted as saying.
"No signals are received from the satellite," he said.
All the other seven foreign satellites (originally reported eight) launched
together with the Mozhayets "have been successfully placed in the preset orbits
and their control transferred to the customers," the spaceport sources said.
"The separation of the other satellites from the carrier rockets took place
on Thursday. The first telemetric information from the satellites came to the
Earth an hour after launch," the sources said.
The experimental space research spacecraft Mozhayets-5 was the main payload
in the launching.
The seven satellites which have been successfully placed into orbit by the
booster include one each from China and the European Space Agency and two from
Iran.
A special commission on the investigation of the contingency situation with
the Mozhayets-5 satellite is to be set up at the Plesetsk cosmodrome, the
spaceport sources said.
An Itar-Tass report had earlier said the Kosmos booster was to put in orbit
nine satellites.
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