Slashdot Mirror
Lax Security At Russian Rocket Plant
theshowmecanuck writes "Reuters reports that there is little or no security at one of the main factories in Russia responsible for military and Soyuz rocket manufacture. Blogger Lana Sator was able to walk right into the empty (off hours) facility through huge gaps in the fences that no-one bothered to repair, and there was no security to stop them aside from some dogs that didn't bother them either. In fact Lana even has one picture of herself posing next to an apparently non-functional security camera, another of her sitting on what looks like to be possibly a partially assembled rocket motor (someone who knows better can fill us in), and has about 100 photos of the escapade all told on her blog about this (it's in Russian... which I don't speak... any translators out there?). Russian officials are said to be deeply concerned. I wonder if this has any bearing on why Russian rockets haven't been making it into space successfully, or whether it and the launch failures are all part of some general industrial malaise that is taking place."
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Flana-sator.livejournal.com%2F160176.html%23cutid1&act=url
another of her sitting on what looks like to be possibly a partially assembled rocket motor
Have gnu, will travel.
... and probably won't see ever again in the future.
Sorry, sometimes it's so sad you get jaded.
They're making these things as cheaply as possible. Know what happens when you do that? #1: Shit doesn't work as well as it should. #2: Repairs to things that aren't mandatory, like security systems and fences, they don't happen.
This is exactly the same problem that's existed in any big beauracracy since the beginning of time.
e.g. read how Feynman irked the guards at Los Alamos by leaving the secure area 5 times without entering.
The beauracracy spends so much effort putting on a show at guarding the official entrances and any other place you might leave or enter? It can't even fit into the minds of the security guys.
They even looked into my pants at the airport!
I imagine that the sophisticated espionage types who want to abscond with your rocket-building expertise(for competitive purposes, or because you aren't selling toys to their nation state of choice) probably aren't stopped by fences and dogs. If they are really serious, you've already hired them and they just walk in the front door every morning. If that is your concern, the prison-camp props probably aren't a huge deal.
I am somewhat surprised, though, that they haven't had a greater incentive to repair the fence and put together something resembling a night watch for reasons of simple theft. Rocket surgery presumably involves some expensive tools, and big piles of parts and stock in various rather pricey metals and alloys. If your security is so fantastic that bored bloggers are wandering in, I'm amazed that the whole operation hasn't been melted down at the nearest scrapyard of loose morals...
Why is Los Angeles Airport's security at a Russian rocket plant?!?
There needs to be an investigation!
Highlights for me:
They entered the facility at a spot where the sensors weren't working- they tested them.
They went more than once to the facility.
Safety measures for oxygen.
Just test stands - no engines.
Did she get to talk to GLaDOS?
Where are the health packs? Where are the randomly placed exploding drums?
O wait those pictures are from a real rocket factory and not some fps could have fooled me. Lots of rust there hmmm
They think people are generally pretty decent and no one is going to come and steal their rockets.
This OMGWTFTERRORISTS mentality is thankfully not yet universal.
The Washington Post (reg required) just had a good report on how Russia's scientific base has changed for the worse. Apparently, the labs are populated with a bimodal mix of young and elderly scientists -- the middle has been hollowed out over the last two decades. And while a new funding push has sent money towards science, much of it is wasted through corruption:
In Russia, the lost generation of science
Lana's blog is interesting at least for the impressive photos...
I frequently walk in out-of-the-way places in Wales and Scotland and have often been suprised to round a bend and come across places where I simply should not be. However, I don't take photos or do anything to attract attention. I simply have a 'hmmm' moment or two, then quietly turn round and walk back the way I came.
Shouldn't this be appraised as the first crowdsourced space program? And look how cute and friendly the puppies are! No full body scans either!
This looks pretty vacant to me. Here the location on google maps:
Khimki, Russia
A little wikipedia research tells you that this is the old OKB-456 development and test facility for the RD-100 engine, a predecessor of the modern RD-107 engines. the plant was build right after WWII to build a copy of the german V2 rocket and probably has not been used for years. Todays Sojus rockets fly with the RD-107 or with its upgrades RD-117 and RD-118. These are produced by NPO energomash in samara at this location:
Progress Plant, Samara
This was a 5 min research, so I could be wrong.
This is not a "plant" where rockets or parts would be assembled. It is just a testing facility where new rocket engine designs can be mounted and studied. It provides a system for dealing with high-temperature engine exaust, which, naturally, is a problem if one wants to monitor the engine in a laboratory conditions. It also provides some measures to deal with test failures, mainly a fire-extinguishing system and blast doors. Apart from that, it is just another low-security building and there's nothing interesting there when no tests are being conducted. It has nothing to do with the actual rocket assembly. Just one big test stand.
It's funny how this is an article about "lack of security" and not "cool photos of rocket plant".
Americans..... just can't stand when people aren't being groped by a security guard.
Seems to me that the plant she was at had been abandoned for more than a few years...
Nothing to see here..... move along.
This is a terrible thing. Why, just imagine if somebody walked right in and then walked right back out with a rocket on their backs!
She's sitting in the socket into which the rocket motor is plugged. The motor is lowered through the doors in the ceiling and conected to the fuel and power lines in the socket. The big round red lid covers the exhaust pipe, which leads outside into that huge tower in the middle of the complex. And as for the security camera, there is no mention of it being broken. Lana says it's likely used to monitor the tests. Since there was no motor in the building at the time, there isn't much reason to watch it. Yeah, sure, there might be sabotage, but I doubt anybody would bother. General vandalism is the most likely threat and those kind of people aren't too keen on trudging a mile through the snow to get to the hole in the fence. Same goes for stealing metal and stuff; people will do it, but they probably won't bother if they have to haul it that far.
The really strange thing in all these pictures is there are not Chairs and almost no tables. I think this might be an abandoned site.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I think that will be more obvious then just 1 person snooping around.
I wonder if this has any bearing on why Russian rockets haven't been making it into space successfully, or whether it and the launch failures are all part of some general industrial malaise that is taking place.
It is quite obviously part of a sickneß, but not an industrial sickneß: it is a civilisational sickneß, and as part of ðe periphery of our exChristian civilisation Rußia is bound to feel its effects even heavier ðan the civilisational core.
Historically, new civilisations start eiðer at ðe periphery of old ones (think Barbarians occupying ðe Roman empire) or out of it, so Rußia might still have some hope, but ðese ings typically take many generations of getting unconsciously rid of old habits of mind and building new ones from ðe most enduring parts of ðe old and from old things from elsewhere
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
stop wasting everyones time saying this plant is defunct or vacant. look at the pictures, the water in the tower one day and not the other. or look at their website where they specifically list the plant as a mailing address. http://www.npoenergomash.ru/eng/about/room/
For display room of the enterprise visiting the letter with the request for visiting by group of employees of the organization (pupils of school or institute, etc.) with the indication of desirable time for visiting is necessary to send to address of the general director. It is necessary to apply the list of group to the letter with the indication of passport data (for minor schoolboys - only the list of group). Such letter should arrive in NPO ENERGOMASH 1-2 weeks prior to date of visiting for groups of citizens of the Russian Federation, for groups with foreign citizens - 2,5 months prior to date of visiting. Final time and date of visiting will be agreeed in the working order by employees of a display room by phone with the contact person of the organization (schools, etc.) specified in the letter.
Information by phones: (495) 572-76-49; (495) 777-27-27, fax (495) 777-21-36.
Address of the enterprise: 141400 Khimki Moscow area, street Burdenko, 1.
"Lax Security" is pretty much everywhere.
USA: Genuine NASA motor:
http://www.ninjito.com/images/2007-01-25/qx-door-3.jpg
Russia, particle colliders:
http://www.ninjito.com/2008-08-24/qx-collider-1.jpg
France, air tunnels
http://www.ninjito.com/_2010-05-07/qx-xx-4.jpg
USA, a certain famous bridge in NYC
http://www.ninjito.com/images/2009-10-07-NYC/qx-b-1.jpg
The only reason this never comes to public attention is because generally, the people that do it don't want public attention.
Used to be that ordinary Russians marveled at American openness, but now it's the other way round! You'll get arrested for taking a photo of the Brooklyn Bridge.
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Man, GSC and THQ are nailing their depictions of abandoned Soviet industrial/power plants. This looks like concept art for Metro 2033.
Backed up the web page and images.
Must be nice to live in a world where everything is possible if you'll only bother to do it. In this world, things cost money, and the Russians don't have any.
Yes, you are probably correct, this is the next inspection date. But so what? It does not change the fact that the installation in question is a large test stand, by far the largest part of which is the system that deals with rocket engine's exaust. Again, it's whole point is to provide a "socket" where you plug an engine prototype in - it is the large tunnel closed by the red lid here: http://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/3008/33213654.de/0_71e50_3a09f837_XXL.jpg - as you can guess, it is close to impossible to do anything with the engine when it's working and the exhaust stream is not safely isolated from the environment and removed from the lab. On the opposite side of the exhaust socket there's the fixture which is used to supply fuel and whatnot to the engine that's being tested. The gates through which the engine is being delivered to the lab are also shown on one of the other pictures. So, no assembly takes place there, only testing. And, as far as my understanding goes, the engines being tested on that site have nothing to do with the production units that are mounted on rockets. Thus saying "look how desolated it is" and something like that is the same as saying "look how desolated GM Crash Testing Site is, no wonder their cars suck" and suchlike.
jezus, add a few zombies and imps, and you essentially got Doom 3
novaya gazeta recently had a story where they interviewed some actual technicians who work at actual rocket factories.
basically the problem is that the managers are too focused on money, and the quality is slipping as a result.
the quality assurance measures that used to be in place have been stopped and deemed too costly.
I've walked into facilities who have absolutely no security in the US, France, Germany and the UK which would be considered important to the nation. Defense contractors who keep their backdoor open all day and a false sense of security with a locked front door and to facilities with no secretary and doors open all day long, you can waltz in, take what you want, and no one will notice, they'll think you work there or you're an outside contractor. Hell, even with a secretary, they just let you in without question. And to those who say they have "security" that there's no way that happens, I probably was already through your entire building without notifying anyone during one of your new installations in the building. You're part of the joke.
Hell, I was at the Boeing plant in Long Beach where they build the C-17, and I just waltzed right into there without any questions from anyone, all that security they have there is a joke.
The only reason no one blogs about it or posts pictures of these issues because they'll probably lose their jobs or not work with said companies ever again. Or they just simply don't care like me.
This attitude is typical through out the world, not just Russians. Just that the Russians allowed it to overtake them that everyone is doing it on a regular basis that no one cares to belittle them about it.
The Soyuz rocket family is now 45 years old, and liquid-fuelled rockets are of limited military utility. Virtually all modern missiles use solid-fuelled rockets because you don't have to sit there with the rocket on the launchpad waiting to fill it up. As such, the security implications of anyone getting a peek at a Soyuz would seem to be rather small.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
kidding.
dunno, but for me this rocket "factory" (takes you to the heavens) is just the same as a "church" (telephone to heaven).
you just steal stuff from a place you can "talk" to god...*shrug*
this is unreal that, but completely believable considering the lackadaisical ways things are going in Russia these days. I always love seeing sites of people wandering through abandoned places in the old Soviet Union, but this is an operational facility where their (recently, much maligned) space program runs from. Wow, wonder if they'll ever pull out of this rut they've been in.
fak3r.com
American tech and machines are all so clean. Gleaming, shiny, spotless and built in clean rooms where everyone wears body-covering overalls and face masks. In order to work on it, you need a special facility and all manner of special equipment and clothing.
Whereas the Russian factories look like a steel mill. All you need to work on Russian equipment is a tool kit, shade tree and a bottle of vodka. And up until now, it's worked pretty good? To the point where we're dependent on them now.
Perhaps that's part of the problem, rather than "sabotage" or "terrorism"? Things have become too dirty, and could use a little cleaning up.
[End Of Line]
Perhaps this is why 2011 warned us of the true threat of cyber warfare: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/20121181245291117.html
2012 could be the year that those concerns come to fruition in the form of a serious attack against civilian critical infrastructure somewhere in the world by a non-state actor.
I thought I was playing Portal 2 again looking at these pics.
In the maintenance guy's defense, the only real difference between an operational Russian rocket factory and one that's been abandoned for 30 years is that most of the lights work in the former and more lazing about is done in latter. He probably didn't realize he was expected to repair fence gaps.
actually, other than the ak-47, Russian tech has been a by-word for "awful hunk of near junk which will kill you before days out." while they have had some elegance, ie giving cosmonauts pencils instead of billion dollar space pens, mostly their efforts are disastrous. Most of their original spacecraft were basically elaborate death traps, their cold war era missile defence systems nearly kicked off ww3, and I don't think they've ever made a decent automobile ever. And the American shuttle program was mostly shut down because NASA wouldn't let anyone strap guns/bombs to one.
It is interesting to note that the Officials are now stating that the security personnel would be punished. The fact that the officials were not proactive and left this happen under their administration only means that they should take responsibility. Of course, they are busy finding a scape goat.
ie giving cosmonauts pencils instead of billion dollar space pens
Oh dear lord, not this again. Please become less fucking stupid.
and at the same time there are still communistic espionage paranoia almost everywhere here in russia.
LOL