Brazil Completes Successful Rocket Launch

CNN/AP ^ | 10/23/04 10/23/04 22:10

[sully777]

Brazil Completes Successful Rocket Launch

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - Brazil successfully launched its first rocket into space, 14 months after a devastating accident that killed 21 space agency employees and damaged the reputation of the country's space program.

The two-stage rocket, named VSB-30, or Brazilian Exploration Vehicle, was launched Saturday afternoon from the Alcantara launch site in Maranhao, about 1,700 miles north of Rio de Janeiro, said officials with the Brazilian Air Force's Research and Development Department.

The successful launch would not only restore the reputation of Latin America's first space program, but it would also allow it to follow through on plans to export the rockets to the European Space Agency where it would reportedly replace the equivalent British-made Skylark rocket.

Brazil plans to sell up to 15 of the rockets, which can carry up to 870 pounds and fly up to 155 miles.

The program was dealt a huge blow in August 2003 when its VLS-1 VO3 rocket exploded in a fiery ball on the launch platform three days before its scheduled launch. The rocket was carrying two research satellites... The accident was the third failure for Brazil's space program, but it was the first in which anyone died. In 1997, a rocket launched from Alcantara crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after liftoff. In 1999, officials destroyed a rocket after it veered off course three minutes after takeoff...

[sully777]

Isn't Brazil working on nuclear weaponry?

[endthematrix]

They proliferate their rocket technology...yet are ardent anti gunners.

[GeronL]

BREAKING-- In a related note, a piece of Brazilian space junk has slammed into and incinerated a Chinese Spy Satellite....... China had no comment but had placed its military on high alert status...............

just kidding

[SunkenCiv]

Eh?

[js1138]

It just goes to show that impoverished socialist third world countries can still get their priorities right.

[SunkenCiv]

Brazil isn't working on nukes. Brazil may not even have an atomic energy program any more, can't recall. The US screwed up by not working with Brazil in its space program, so now it is cozy with China. Some would think it's better for Brazil to be reliant on China for missile technology (thanks to Clinton, China got help in its missile program from the US), but most of them would be Chinese. :')

George W. Bush will be reelected by a margin of at least ten per cent

[mmartins]

A lot of Brazilians are descended from people who climbed out of U-boats in 1945, so perhaps this isn't too surprising

[SunkenCiv]

There are quite a number of Brazilians with some German ancestors, but those date (for the most part) from the late 19th century. My GGfather had a brother and a sister who migrated to Brazil circa 1875.