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Posted by: remcook Jun 17 2005, 11:45 AM

for updates:

http://planetary.org/solarsailblog/index.html

main page:

http://www.planetary.org/solarsail/

Posted by: remcook Jun 21 2005, 01:47 PM

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0506/21solarsail/

Posted by: djellison Jun 21 2005, 07:29 PM

1946Z is the expected launch time - but the Planetary Soc site is totally down, and I'm flicking between Sky News, BBC News 24, CNN, Fox, ITV news, Euronews - not not a sausage so far

Doug

Posted by: djellison Jun 21 2005, 07:37 PM

Ahh

"Liftoff the rocket won’t be immediately confirmed. The launch is being conducted by the Russian Navy. They will contact Lavochkin Association near Moscow who will then relay the information to The Planetary Society."

Old School Russia alive and well

Doug

Posted by: dilo Jun 21 2005, 07:53 PM

Jun 21, 2005 | 12:48 PDT | 19:48 UTC
Launch plus 0 hours 2 min

Normal first stage separation! WE'RE OFF!

Jun 21, 2005 | 12:46 PDT | 19:46 UTC
Launch plus 0 hours 0 min

"This is Pasadena, we have nominal launch, unverified."

Posted by: dilo Jun 21 2005, 08:15 PM

From CNN:
Solar spacecraft blasts off
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/TECH/space/06/21/russia.cosmos.reut/index.html

...However Planetary Society reports:

Jun 21, 2005 | 13:11 PDT | 20:11 UTC
Launch plus 0 hours 25 min

Report from Kamchatka is that they did not detect the spacecraft

This isn't necessarily unexpected. Petropavlovsk was a marginal contact, and it would have been happening while the spacecraft was spinning rapidly and thrusting, not an easy signal to deal with.

We are holding our breaths for the Majuro contact.

Posted by: Sunspot Jun 21 2005, 08:16 PM

damn you beat me to it

Posted by: Sunspot Jun 21 2005, 08:19 PM

Jun 21, 2005 | 13:15 PDT | 20:15 UTC
Launch plus 0 hours 31 min

Majuro does not see signal yet

Posted by: Sunspot Jun 21 2005, 08:21 PM

Jun 21, 2005 | 13:21 PDT | 20:21 UTC
Launch plus 0 hours 35 min

Still nothing at Majuro

.....this is looking disappointing

Posted by: dilo Jun 21 2005, 08:37 PM

Yes... However now it seems they received some signal and then lost it due to motor injection...

Posted by: djellison Jun 21 2005, 08:39 PM

Guess it might have safed during launch or something

Who knows.

I cant wait to try and spot it in the sky with my new digi cam

Doug

Posted by: helvick Jun 21 2005, 09:16 PM

So no panic stations yet.

Posted by: volcanopele Jun 21 2005, 09:23 PM

I suspect Doug maybe right about it safing after launch. Not perfect, but not exactly unusual.

Posted by: dilo Jun 21 2005, 09:45 PM

From last update, "there's no communication at all wth the spacecraft" and "A contingency plan for this is now being put into effect".
Not very encouraging to me...

Posted by: dilo Jun 21 2005, 10:20 PM

A press conference now, information should be forthcoming.
They said: "There is some telemetry data from the launch phase that doesn't appear quite right", but is not clear what... "On the other hand we do not have direct evidence for failure."

Posted by: edstrick Jun 21 2005, 11:30 PM

Was the kick-stage a solid motor?.... they have been known to rupture or detonate during the burn.
<eep!>
cross fingers and pray to the launch-gods.

Posted by: buddy1475 Jun 22 2005, 02:23 AM

We shuld just be happy that they didnt fire the wrong ICBM.

Posted by: deglr6328 Jun 22 2005, 04:44 AM

Telemetry received from Kamchatka! They suspect its in an improper orbit though.

Posted by: dilo Jun 22 2005, 05:34 AM

...
From last blog:"Where could we be? Odds are, if it was a problem with the launch vehicle, [...] our orbit is more likely elliptical than circular, and also lower, and therefore faster than we expect. Without knowing where the spacecraft is, it becomes harder and harder to find as we go out from the launch date. Strategic Command has not seen the spacecraft -- we don't know why."
The american space surveillance system should be able to track it... however, if orbit is lower than expected, there isn't much hope to save the mission (fast orbit decay, especially after sail deploy)...

Posted by: edstrick Jun 22 2005, 07:39 AM

If the periapsis is below some fairly well determined altitude, even if the orbit is stable, the spacecraft will have too much aerodynamic drag to successfully deploy the sails, I suspect.

Does the spacecraft have any propulsion at all, even by using up a good fraction of the attitude control <I presume it has that> propellant?

If periapsis is way too low, the spacecraft could do 1 or 2 or 10 orbits and then decay. That's in the slightly sub-90-miles altitude range.

Posted by: djellison Jun 22 2005, 09:18 AM

And as fans of orbiter know - the kick need to raise from say 500x90 to 500x500 isnt that much iirc

(goes away, opens orbiter)

Yeah - from a 500km x 90km orbit - I was at 7055m/sec and needed to raise that to 7174 m/s to circularise at 500k (ish) - we're taking 120m/sec. I doubt, to be honest, if it's got that much kick on board.

Depending on the current atmos. conditions, 90km might be enough to kill it in half a dozen orbits or it might survive a dozen or so - who knows. Sans-sails, it's fairly small so not that

This might turn out to be one of those amazing mission-rescue jobs, or it might turn out to be a total loss

Pity - I was really looking forward to spotting it with heavens-above.com


Doug

Posted by: Sunspot Jun 22 2005, 11:28 AM

It's a shame they havent been able to launch it on something a bit more reliable - but that would dramaticlly increase the cost. Didn't the last attempt also fail due to a problem with the launch vehicle?

Posted by: djellison Jun 22 2005, 11:40 AM

They had a pair of the solar sails packed onto an experimental craft that came to nothing iirc, the idea being a simple lob into space - deploy the sails as a test, then jettison and re-entry in a sub-orbital mode, but nothing came of it.

I suppose they could have gone with a Dnepr - they've worked a few times and are bound to be a similar price http://www.russianspaceweb.com/dnepr.html

Doug

Posted by: deglr6328 Jun 22 2005, 09:37 PM

Latest news----> its dead. Planetary Soc. weblog confirms it is a suspected launch vehicle failure and signals recieved yesterday were just "phantoms". oh well.

Posted by: BruceMoomaw Jun 23 2005, 12:03 AM

Yep, R.I.P. Cosmos 1. The booster's FIRST stage failed only 83 seconds after launch:

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050622/ap_on_sc/solar_sail_7

Interesting that it took the Russians so long to admit it.

Posted by: Bob Shaw Jun 23 2005, 10:37 PM

Perhaps the success of the X-Prize will result in the 'Solar Regatta' being revamped. Hand launch from the ISS anyone? After SuitSat *anything* is possible!

"Aaargh, Jim lad, takes me back, man and boy, thirty years afore the Kevlar ™ mast... ...roger the cabin-boy... ...splice the mainframe..."

"Just fire the Photon Torpedoes will you, Mr Scott?"

Posted by: hal_9000 Jun 28 2005, 10:41 PM

There is a Cosmos 1 launch video on Planetary Society's site!
http://planetary.org/solarsail/launch_video.html

Posted by: ljk4-1 Oct 3 2005, 04:38 AM

TPS trying for Cosmos 2 - but without the Volna rocket

"We are comfortable with the conclusion that Cosmos 1 never made it to orbit because the launch vehicle failed. But we are not comfortable with the reason it happened: the Volna selected for our payload had not been upgraded to correct a known failure mode. We will not fly on a Volna again. We’ve learned that lesson—and it was certainly a hard one. We are now ready to find a new launch vehicle, establish better launch vehicle interfaces, and try again to fly the first solar sail spacecraft."

http://planetary.org/solarsail/update_20050930.html

Posted by: ljk4-1 Dec 8 2005, 06:27 PM

December 2 , 2005

The Planetary Society solar sail team is working to try again to fly the world’s first solar sail spacecraft. With a tested spacecraft design, almost all flight components available, and at least two attractive launch vehicle possibilities, we are well positioned to reach our goal.

We’ve made considerable progress: Our Lavochkin/Space Research Institute team in Russia has identified two promising and affordable launch vehicles candidates for our spacecraft.

The rest is here:

http://www.planetary.org/programs/projects/innovative_technologies/solar_sailing/ss_update_20051202.html

Posted by: ljk4-1 May 5 2006, 07:24 PM

The Planetary Society (TPS) Executive Director Louis Friedman has
announced that plans are underway for Cosmos 2.

The details here:

http://www.space.com/adastra/adastra_isdc_musk_060504.html

The relief part is that they will be using a Soyuz-Fregat or Cosmos 3M
launcher to get Cosmos 2 into Earth orbit as a piggyback payload.

They may be more expensive rockets, but look what happened when
we tried to launch Cosmos 1 on the cheap.

Posted by: ustrax Jun 8 2006, 03:58 PM

Were you aware of this project from ESA?:

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=38980

Posted by: DonPMitchell Jun 8 2006, 06:14 PM

Maybe they can get Cosmos-2 loaded into one of the Nauka packages on the next spy satellite. Hehe.

Cool project, but I don't like that they are using a rather generic name, and one already used. Is it that the Russians launched "Kosmos-1" and now we are launching a "Cosmos-1"?

Posted by: SigurRosFan Nov 6 2006, 10:54 AM

Some news ...

- http://www.newscientistspace.com/article/dn10448-solar-sail-mission-to-rise-again.html

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The group could get the craft ready in one or two years – if they can raise about $5 million.

"We're not interested in trying on the Volna again," Louis Friedman, executive director for the Planetary Society, told New Scientist.

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