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ESA Cryosat Launch Reported Failure

Posted by Zonk on from the cold-reception dept.

hptux06 writes "Earlier today the ESA lauched their "Cryosat" satellite, designed to monitor ice levels across the Arctic/Antarctic. It's being reported a failure, disappearing 90 minutes after the launch. It cost £90M (160M US$) to build, and was supposed to spend three years determining the effects of global warming." From the article: "The satellite rode into space on a Rockot vehicle, a converted SS-19 intercontinental ballistic missile. The rocket, which in the Cold War would have been armed with nuclear weapons, had been modified for peaceful space duties with the addition of a Breeze-KM upper stage. Dr Matthias Oehm, chief executive officer of Eurockot, said they had not received the expected signals from either the spacecraft or the upper stage of the rocket that should have injected it into orbit. "

7 of 277 comments (clear)

  1. Further info here... by Richard_at_work · · Score: 4, Informative

    Eurockot pressrelease

    Looks like it was another controller foulup that stopped a command from being issued to shut down stage 1 and seperate the upper stack, and causing a reentry of the entire package.

  2. confirmed lost in arctic ocean by maharg · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4323378.stm

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    $ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
    @(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
  3. Video of the explosion. by Chickenofbristol55 · · Score: 2, Informative

    On the bbc.com, there is a video of the launch and the subsequent explosion of the rocket. Just goes to show you that getting into space is difficult and risky. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4323378. stm/

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    public class null extends java applet { System.out.print ("Tabula Rasa"); }
    1. Re:Video of the explosion. by Chickenofbristol55 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Oops, here's a link that works. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4323378. stm

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      public class null extends java applet { System.out.print ("Tabula Rasa"); }
  4. the US already has an ice observing satellite by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    http://icesat.gsfc.nasa.gov/

    It has been operational since January 2003.

  5. Re:Hardware or software? by Detritus · · Score: 4, Informative

    They didn't load it by mistake. They intentionally reused large parts of the Ariane-3 flight software to save money. The problem was that it wasn't adequately tested to make sure that it worked correctly with the Ariane-4 flight profile. This resulted in an overflow error during the flight, crashing the guidance computers. The flight was terminated after the guidance system failed.

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    Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
  6. Re:It's a conspiracy... by cheesybagel · · Score: 2, Informative

    Soyuz was designed by Sergei Korolev's design team as the R-7 ICBM. UR-100N (NATO designation SS-19) was from Vladimir Chelomei's design team (see Rokot). They also designed Proton, and that is a fairly reliable launcher. Proton is marketed by ILS.