Russian Cargo Rocket Bound for Space Station Explodes, Crashes 325 Seconds After Launch
- Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:42pm by
Liz Klimas
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(The Blaze/AP) — An unmanned Russian supply ship bound for the International Space Station failed to reach its planned orbit Wednesday, and pieces of it fell in Siberia amid a thunderous explosion, officials said.
A brief statement from Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, did not specify whether the Progress supply ship that was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan had been lost.
But the state news agency RIA Novosti quoted Alexander Borisov, head of a the Choisky region in Russia’s Altai province, as saying pieces of the craft fell in his area some 1,500 kilometers (900 miles) northeast of the launch site.
“The explosion was so strong that for 100 kilometers (60 miles) glass almost flew out of the windows,” he was quoted as saying. Borisov said there were no immediate reports of casualties.
Watch a report here from Russia Today:
According to the video report, this crash is causing “tremors of nervousness in Roscosmos because this is the fourth hiccup as it were in under a year in their space program.”
The Russian Emergencies Ministry and Roscosmos officials could not be reached for comment.
The space agency statement said the third stage of the rocket firing the ship into space had failed at 325 seconds into the launch.
The ship was carrying more than 2.5 tons of supplies, including oxygen, food and fuel. Since the ending of the U.S. space shuttle program this summer, Russian spaceships are a main supply link to the space station.
There are six astronauts aboard the International Space Station, which orbits 350 kilometers (220 miles) above the Earth. They are Russians Andrei Borisenko, Alexander Samokuyayev and Sergei Volkov, Americans Michael Fossum and Ronald Garan and Satoshi Furukawa of Japan.
“The supplies aboard the space station are actually pretty fat” after the resupply mission by space shuttle Atlantis in July, NASA spokesman Kelly Humphries said from Houston. “So we don’t anticipate any immediate impact to the crew.”
Humphries stressed that NASA was waiting to get more details from Russian space officials on what actually happened.
The Interfax news agency cited a Russian space analyst, Sergei Puzanov, as saying the space station had supplies already aboard that could last two to three months and “the situation with the loss of the Progress cannot be called critical.”
In July of 2010, a Progress supply ship failed in its first automatic docking attempt due to equipment malfunction, but was connected with the orbiting laboratory two days later.
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Comments (121)
georgeisn6
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:10pmThey must have got some defective parts from the USofA.
Report Post »Progessives=Fail
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:25pmNo, It was George Bush’s fault.
Report Post »Progessives=Fail
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:31pmThis is an embarrassment…
NASA on Tuesday signed a contract to pay $55.8 million per astronaut for six Americans to fly into space on Russian Soyuz capsules in 2013 and 2014. NASA needs rides on Russian rockets to the International Space Station because it plans to retire the space shuttle fleet later this year.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/04/07/cost-russian-soyuz-rockets-soaring/#ixzz1VyMRqkoS
Report Post »stablepar
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:44pmso glad we gave our space program to the communists. NOT!!!
turtleboy
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 6:59pmSomething smells fishy here. The story says windows were nearly knocked out at 60 MILES.The story also says the third stage of the rocket failed to ignite. That means the first two stages had already burned. The third stage of a soyous(sp) rocket holds about 8000 lbs of fuel, and they were also carrying 2500 lbs of supplies including fuel. So, the max amount of fuel would have been about 10,000 lbs. 10,000 lbs of TNT wouldn’t even be felt at 60 miles, let alone blowing out windows – and this wasn’t TNT, it was fuel. The 15 kiloton nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima didn’t do any damage at all outside about 8 miles, and that bomb was 3000 TIMES more powerful than 10,000 lbs of TNT. I could be wrong, but could the Russians be weaponizing space.
Report Post »The-Monk
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 7:07pmAnd how much did that cost us? How much of the lost (destroyed) cargo was from us and how much did we pay the Russians to take it to the ISS? Did we have insurance on it? If we did… who collects and who follows the money?
Report Post »NEMATIC
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 7:37pmProbably, Union made parts.
Report Post »old white guy
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 10:27amheh, good thing there were no u.s. people hitching a ride. close nasa and use it as a muslim outreach program good move obama, you idiot.
Report Post »Moe1138
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 2:01pm…China.
Report Post »imreddog
Posted on August 26, 2011 at 3:29pmWhat astronaut are they going to find that is stupid enough to sit atop a Russian missle to go into space?
Report Post »hudent
Posted on August 27, 2011 at 4:05amshut up buddy!!!
Report Post »Steel
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:09pmJust in case you hadn’t figured it out, Russia’s rockets are now being made in China! LMAO!
Report Post »Morgan_Edwards
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 6:34pmIn Soviet Russia, rockets launch you!
Report Post »consrv
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:04pmWhere’s the taxi?
Report Post »christos
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:03pm……Some will do anything for attention or distraction or staging watch the other hand in this case hands…
Report Post »piper60
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 6:46pmYeppers!
Report Post »N37BU6
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 10:26pmI dunno… it’s pretty commonplace, and not much of a distraction these days.
Report Post »jmgair
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:01pmNow that Obama has discontinued our Shuttle program with no real alternative except these Russian rockets to supply and serve the space station any American space activity must hitch a ride on one of these Russian space crafts, great job Barry.
Report Post »SimpleTruths
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:47pmSorry to introduce facts here but the Shuttle program was cancelled (by not funding it) on Bush’s watch.
Report Post »woodyb
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 4:30pm@ SIMPLETRUTHS –
The Shuttle program died a natural death (what has it been, 25 or so years?), but since you seem to want to deal in FACTS, OBOZO (and not congress) canceled the program (I cannot recall its name) which was to have been the Shuttle successor!!!!!!!!!!!!
Report Post »Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:00am@SimpleTruths
Presidents can’t fund anything, Congress does that.
Report Post »Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:06am@woodyb
NASA’s new mission, as directed by Obummer, is as ambassador to the middle east. The reason given for Obummer’s scrapping most of the NASA mission was in order to use NASA to “build better relations with the middle east.” ???
Report Post »NWalters78
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:53pmTHESE are the guys we’re counting on to hitch a ride to the International Space Station with????
Good call, Obama. Stupid sod.
Report Post »HKS
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:03pmWell let’s see here now, shut down the space program that’s given us all the technology we have in the last 40 years, lay off thousands of people, hitch a ride with the Russians, save that money and pay more unemployment and welfare, to hell with future technology investments. Sounds like a plan for the demise of a nation to me.
Report Post »woodyb
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 4:32pm@ HKS –
Sounds pretty much that way to me, also!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Report Post »KickinBack
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:52pmDon’t worry folks. Obama will have the solution. Obama will just give the the Russians ALL of our technology in order to make trips safer in the future.
Report Post »Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:09amSorta like Klinton and the Chicoms.
Report Post »OmikeO
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:51pmI bet that space craft has a labile on each and every part of it that says “MADE IN CHINA”
Report Post »Obama_Sham
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:58pm“labile on each and every part of it that says “MADE IN CHINA””
I was thinking the same thing…
Report Post »Gonzo
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:45pmHow does hitching a ride with the Russians sound now NASA?
Report Post »knockered
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:54pmWe can all thank oblamer for this he’s the one that cancelled the shuttle for some other outragous communist plan. It’s all part of the master plan him and Soros have in mind…just saying
Report Post »SimpleTruths
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:52pmFACT: The Shuttle program was effectively killed on Bush’s watch – funding was vetoed. Next lie please.
Report Post »Obama Snake Oil Co
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:14pmJust for clarification, the democrats in the last two years of Bush’s second term, killed the space program to make way for entitlement programs.
Report Post »The-Monk
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 7:50pm@Gonzo
Report Post »It sounds like a big explosion. Only next time our Astronauts will be on it. After a few rides with the Russians we won’t have any more Astronauts left.
Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:01am@Obama Snake Oil Co
That’s right, Congress holds the purse strings, not the President.
Report Post »bobcattf5
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:40pmNow how are we going to supply the Station when the U.S. has nothing and the Russian crap blows up??? The Chinese or Japanese??? What if their Crap Blows Up!!! Gilligan’s island in space!!!!
Report Post »BOMUSTGO
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 7:03pmThere is always a Soyuz spacecraft docked with the ISS so they can escape back to earth.
Report Post »kindling
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:31pmI hope no one was injured or killed on the ground.
Report Post »inexiletill2012
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:21pmTime to UN-retire the Space Shuttle
Report Post »Gary Fishaholic
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:30pmYou are so right can you believe that our astronauts are looking forward to this I think not. They might even drop out of the program and who would blame them.
Report Post »mrbunnylamakins
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 4:04pmI agree, they commented that Russia shuttle program is more stable than U.S. . Well they spoke too soon!
Report Post »darkrage000
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:18am@Gary Fishaholic
Report Post »Astronauts?
Oh, you mean the PASSENGERS…..
Hickory
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:16pmActually, the Russians have had a very high percentage of success with their supply ships. This was bound to happen sooner or later. It just emphasizes the fact that space travel is dangerous. There is no 100% perfection in anything made by man.
Report Post »texanpatriot
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:31pm@Hickory
Report Post »Think about what you just said: This airline has a very high percentage of success… (a disaster is) bound to happen sooner or later.
Now boarding rows 21-45!!!
I think I will take the train.
How can you count on supplying the Space Station? Which Astronauts will volunteer to fly?
You missed the point. We have 3 Trillion of taxes that we give to the government and they cannot afford to fly the next generation of Space Shuttle? A true embarrassment which seems to be par for the course. Maybe our President will apologize when we lose lives.
NWalters78
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:54pmTypical response from a Kool Aid drinking Obama voter. ‘It wasn’t THAT bad.‘ It isn’t THAT GOOD, either.
Idiot.
Report Post »Delores at CH WV
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:32pmTexas, you forgot, Obama never supports Americans! Remember, he gave the Global World those Trillions of borrowed money, USA received little money from the Treasury and NO REAL LONGTERM JOBS!
Report Post »Chuck Stein
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:51pmWhy are you guys slamming Hickory? He makes a good point about space travel in general — it is dangerous (do the words “Challenger” and “Columbia” ring a bell?). Why read a political message or spin into that?
Report Post »And, yeah, it does stink to high heaven that we don’t have a man-rated launch vehicle to get into space.
SimpleTruths
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 2:56pmTEXANPATRIOT
Report Post »Fact: There is no “next generation” of shuttles. Work on the design and testing of the next generation of shuttles was killed by Geo. Bush in his second year in office. It takes at least a decade to build a machine as complicated as the shuttle. Another dead hand Obama was dealt.
Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:13amLOL@SimpleTruths
Report Post »TOPOFTHEGAME
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:07pmDidn’t the administration say it was going to cost $50K a person for us to send a people to the space station and back???? I believe we need to insure their lives, looking at the Russia’s track record. WE SHOULDN’T HAVE GOTTEN RID OF NASA……..Or did we just give it to the Muslims????????
Report Post »marhee9
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:14pmCouldn’t agree more. This hardly gives me a “warm fuzzy” for our future astronauts that will be now be mere passengers on this craft. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKZhaEFA1Yk
Report Post »BIGJAYINPA
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:22pmSomeone please explain to me WHY IN THE HECK ARE WE DEPENDING ON THE RUSSIANS TO SUPPLY THE SPACE STATION?? What idiot thought this was a good idea??? Can we fire that dolt for incompetence??…..Just askin’
Report Post »lecar
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:06pmI would say unintended consequences of bad government policy, but I am starting to think this is deliberate.
Report Post »ILUVAMERICA
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:16pmWe ARE witnessing the BEGINNING of the END of this system that we live in
Report Post »prepare/ there will be survivors
get right with OUR CREATOR and help to usher in a new system FREE of violence
poverty.sucks
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:03pmAnother Mark on the list of Failures of Obama
Report Post »darkrage000
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:35amWhat are you talking about? Its not a failure… its worked out exactly as he planned
Report Post »JLGunner
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:01pmWho didn’t see this coming?
Report Post »stablepar
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:47pmbarry hussein soetero. that‘s who didn’t ‘see this coming….or did he
Report Post »Iowa_man
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:57pmDont worry, the Muslim outreach that NASA is tasked with will make the Muslims feel so good that they will build a rocket and help us. Help us to Armageddon that is. Gotta love the bamster. never ending source of amazement.
Report Post »912anita
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:55pmWow Bummer. I instantly thought about who was receiving the supplies and whether is would impact them. Looks like that is ok for now – but let’s pray for the six astronauts for which these supplies were meant.
Report Post »Anonymous T. Irrelevant
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 1:20pmNot sure how long it takes Russia to build another rocket, but I hope it is less than 2 months.
Report Post »AlansTigg
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:51pmso glad we backed out and left it all to them
Report Post »13th Imam
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:51pmHiccup??? What was Actual American Taxpayers forced contribution to this hiccup???
Russian reply to NASA!
Da, we had a hiccup, Da.
Report Post »randy
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:50pmthis crash is causing “tremors of nervousness in Roscosmos because this is the fourth hiccup as it were in under a year in their space program.”
And this is where our Astronauts are hitching a ride?
Report Post »ctdhand
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 3:33pmCan anyone say Spacex. An american company that will have our resupply back. Man travel is still a while off.
Report Post »capitalismrocks
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:50pmPull the shuttle out of mothballs !!!! We cannot rely on those antique Russian gumball machine rockets, those pieces of junk should’nt be used to transport garbage, they should be tossed in a dump AS garbage… and these Commie’s think they are going to build a luxury hotel in space?!?!?
Russian Space Program = EPIC FAIL
Report Post »theothertoolbox
Posted on August 26, 2011 at 2:53amI spoke to a NASA employee this past weekend and she told me that it had gotten very expensive and complicated (more so than usual with all the bureaucracies) to find replacement parts for the shuttles. She also stated that they had to do last-minute parts swapping with the remaining shuttles and then obtain parts for the shuttles they had stolen parts off of. A big reason for this is that a lot of the companies that had made parts for the shuttle have long since gone out of business. NASA and the government did a fine job of “spreading the wealth” so to speak when it came to different contractors manufacturing specific parts. This created an nightmarish mission when it came to finding/building replacement parts. She said that a lot of folks inside NASA are very glad that they do not have to scramble to keep the shuttles flying anymore (a lot of room for errors were lurking). The future of space flight will be in the hands of private industry now…the way it should have been all along. NASA is also funding a lot of this innovation, which is a good thing to spend money on instead of worrying about “cost plus” contractors.
Report Post »theprofessor1031
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:48pmBoy, sure is a good thing we cancelled our shuttle program and are leaving it all up to the Russians! That’s gonna work out well.
Report Post »vennoye
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:55pmHow right your are!! Of course, we can’t afford space………no green in that!!
Report Post »texanpatriot
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:48pmWho is glad we will depend on the Ruskies to deliver our Astronauts and satellites to space? When we do cut spending why not cut our NASA budget?
Report Post »I can think of a number of unproductive expenses that would be addressed before what has been a proud tradition going back to John Glenn.
capitalismrocks
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 12:53pmActually it goes back to Alan Sheppard, he was the first US Astronaut, followed by Gus Grissom (who later died in the fire on Apollo 1) and then John Glenn flew.
Report Post »BOMUSTGO
Posted on August 24, 2011 at 7:07pmJohn Glenn was the first American to orbit the earth. Alan Shepherd just had a 15 minute suborbital flight making him the first American in space.
Report Post »Viet Vet
Posted on August 25, 2011 at 12:19amAnd then Glenn as a democrap Senator got caught in the Keating Five, Savings and Loan Scandal.
Report Post »