Cosmos-1 solar-sail craft's fate unclear
June 22, 2005The fate of the Cosmos-1 solar-sail was unclear Wednesday, with Russian officials calling it a failure and U.S. scientists reporting weak contact.
A source at Russia's Northern Fleet headquarters told the Novosti news agency the launching rocket engine stopped working 83 seconds into the flight "and the satellite failed to reach orbit" Tuesday.
But the U.S. sponsors of the experimental craft, the Planetary Society, refused to give up hope and reported several hours later that tracking stations in Siberia, Oceania and the Czech Republic had picked up weak signals from the craft.
The $4 million Cosmos-1 was launched from a Russian submarine Tuesday in the Barents sea riding on a Soviet-era ballistic missile.
It was developed by a privately funded U.S.-Russian consortium and is designed to prove the potential of solar sailing technology, which could one day allow spacecraft to gradually accelerate through space without having to carry fuel.
Copyright 2005 by United Press International
-
Engineers build first sub-10-nm carbon nanotube transistor
Feb 01, 2012 |
4.9 / 5 (31) |
30
-
Something old, something new: Evolution and the structural divergence of duplicate genes
Jan 31, 2012 |
4.6 / 5 (7) |
1
-
The hidden nanoworld of ice crystals: Revealing the dynamic behavior of quasi-liquid layers
Jan 30, 2012 |
5 / 5 (3) |
1
-
Stock market network reveals investor clustering
Jan 27, 2012 |
3.9 / 5 (23) |
8
-
Of microchemistry and molecules: Electronic microfluidic device synthesizes biocompatible probes
Jan 26, 2012 |
5 / 5 (1) |
0
More news stories
NASA sees wide-eyed cyclone Jasmine
Cyclone Jasmine's eye has opened wider on NASA satellite imagery, as it moves through the Southern Pacific Ocean.
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
3 hours ago |
not rated yet |
1
NASA sees Giovanna reach cyclone strength, threaten Madagascar
Tropical Storm 12S built up steam and became a cyclone on February 10, 2012 as NASA's Terra satellite passed overhead. Residents of east-central Madagascar should prepare for this cyclone to make landfall ...
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
3 hours ago |
not rated yet |
0
Humans may have helped the decline of African rainforests 3000 years ago
(PhysOrg.com) -- Large areas of rainforests in Central Africa mysteriously disappeared over three thousand years ago, to be replaced by savannas. The prevailing theory has been that the cause was a change ...
Could Venus be shifting gear?
(PhysOrg.com) -- ESAs Venus Express spacecraft has discovered that our cloud-covered neighbour spins a little slower than previously measured. Peering through the dense atmosphere in the infrared, the ...
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
11 hours ago |
5 / 5 (7) |
7
|
Mars Science Laboratory computer issue resolved
(PhysOrg.com) -- Engineers have found the root cause of a computer reset that occurred two months ago on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory and have determined how to correct it.
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
12 hours ago |
4.7 / 5 (6) |
3
|
Google users warned of threat to smartphone wallets
Users of Google smartphone wallets were being warned on Friday that there is a way to crack pass codes intended to thwart thieves from going on illicit shopping sprees.
Anonymous knocks CIA website offline (Update)
The website of the Central Intelligence Agency was inaccessible on Friday after the hacker group Anonymous claimed to have knocked it offline.
Complex wiring of the nervous system may rely on a just a handful of genes and proteins
Researchers at the Salk Institute have discovered a startling feature of early brain development that helps to explain how complex neuron wiring patterns are programmed using just a handful of critical genes. ...
New error-correcting codes guarantee the fastest possible rate of data transmission
Error-correcting codes are one of the triumphs of the digital age. Theyre a way of encoding information so that it can be transmitted across a communication channel such as an optical fiber o ...
Putting the squeeze on planets outside our solar system
(PhysOrg.com) -- Using high-powered lasers, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and collaborators discovered that molten magnesium silicate undergoes a phase change in the liquid state, abruptly ...
The power of estrogen -- male snakes attract other males
A new study has shown that boosting the estrogen levels of male garter snakes causes them to secrete the same pheromones that females use to attract suitors, and turned the males into just about the sexiest ...