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Uprated "10-ton" Ariane 5 Fails
Soft writes "The latest version of the European Ariane 5 booster ("ESC-A") has failed on its first launch. Liftoff was good up to booster separation but the core stage shut down one minute afterwards or so. The rocket was supposed to lift ten metric tons (22,000 lb) to geostationary transfer orbit, versus 6.7 for the previous Ariane 5G (and 5 and 5.3 for the latest Atlas 5 and Delta 4). Arianespace planned to retire its other launchers (Ariane 4, Ariane 5G) in favor of Ariane 5 ESC-A. Next launch, of space probe Rosetta, was due in mid-January."
There were two satellites on board, a Hotbird TM7 spacecraft, which would have served TV and music. It was supposed to replace Hotbird 3 at 13.0EL, though now that obviouosly wont happen.
Also the Stentor spacecraft was on board, this satellite was equiped with six Ku transponders, and was destined for 11.0WL.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
... was due to re-used software code from the Ariane 4 program, except that some values that the soft was supposed to handle were WAY bigger than during the (near perfect, by the way) Ariane 4 program. It was a plain overflow issue... The worst comes: the issue was known and documented, but somehow forgot during the upgrade from V4 to V5...
;))
Anyway, it's pretty sad (AND NOT DUE TO THE USE OF THE METRIC SYSTEM, for you US fellows
System.out.println("coucou");
There's a nice table here (middle of page) showing some raw numbers between 1957 and 1998. Basically, 3022 of 3092 (97%) total launches were successful.
Actually, all of our (American) unmanned rockets are launched on Lockheed and Boeing vehicles. The government owns the launch sites but I seem to recall recently that even that has changed with one of the pads at KSC being purchased by someone. The space shuttle is maintained by a Boeing/Lockheed conglomerate under contract with NASA. And many of our space probes are built at least jointly in cooperation with industry. NASA is the beurocracy (don't mean that negatively) who pays for and manages these programs.
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
"Yes, I'm glad we got some peaceful dividends from ICBM work, but this could have been achieved more cheaply,"
Um... the US space program has had little if anything in common with our ICBM program since the Gemini program at the latest. Sure, the Redstone and the original Atlas were originally made to lob nukes, but once we were launching something bigger than a Mercury capsule, our ICBM boosters just didn't cut it. Unlike the Soviets, we could make nukes that were small enough to be launched on rockets too small for a manned space program (where do you think their head start in the space race came from?).
I mean, come on, unless you're going to nuke a target on the Moon, what use is a Saturn V in a nuclear war? Sure, it could be used to throw kilotons of conventional explosives half-way around the world (think "Skylab made of C-4"), but...
The insurers can. I work for a company that operates satellites, and the lowest insurance costs are for Russian launchers, because of their proven success rates. BTW, the insurers are British.
In other words, one of the reasons that amatuer development is so limited is not simply cost. It's large space programs saying things like "we have experience and the finances to absorb failure, so that is why we reccomend you stay out of it. "the stars are not for man" kind of philosophy, if you get my drift. I'm not saying that it's great that something blew up, I'm saying that the it's bunk to say things like "leave this to the pros. space exploration is too complicated for civilians." or haven't you noticed, that instead of when airplanes, televisions, and computers were in the early stage of innovation, there aren't many private backers of orbital ventures. Is that a coincidence? BTW, I could really do without commenting on the moderation and have an intelligent conversation. You might almost think that moderation has any great bearing on the subjects that we discuss :)
In other words, this unmasks the myth that somehow exists that private innovators have no place in the big league of space. If billions of dollars and hundreds of scientists, plus the backing of a unified europe fails sometimes too, maybe there is hope for those who don't have as much resources but have the same if not greater desire.
http://cincyboys.blogspot.com/ Everything Cincinnati. Including the word 'Finnih'
Yup, that's roughly it, data overflowed.
The reason the code was still running after launch at all was that it was related to rocket gyroscope calibration and took a long time to set up. By setting it to carry on after launch as opposed to shutting down bang on takeoff was that, if there was a late abort, there could also be a really quick restart because they didn't have to recalibrate. This was sensible and was used at least once.
What wasn't sensible was:
* Carrying over code from Ariane 4 to 5 without checking the spec for differences, as it overflowed unprotected due to a ground speed reading Ariane 4 couldn't have achieved
* Having a redundant backup that was identical on the assumption that they'd only need one for random hardware failure. With this as a software failure, the two went almost simultaneously.
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!