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(FRENCH) Super rocket explodes on launch (OOPS ALERT)
BBC News ^
| December 12, 2002
| BBC News
Posted on 12/11/2002 5:11:48 PM PST by MadIvan

Europe's new heavy-lift rocket has failed on its maiden flight.
The Ariane 5-ESCA blasted off from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana at 1921 (2221 GMT) local time and blew up three minutes later.
We have already known failures, we will know more
Jean-Yves Le Gall, Arianespace |
No explanation for the loss has yet been given by officials from Arianespace, the rocket's operators, who have scheduled a media conference for Thursday. It is not clear whether the vehicle suffered a catastrophic failure or controllers noticed something was wrong and took the painful decision to destroy the rocket.
Main stage
Wednesday's launch was the second attempt to get the Ariane 5-ESCA airborne. The first countdown on 28 November was halted because of a computer glitch.
The launcher was a beefed-up version of the vehicle that first went into full commercial service in 1999.
Wednesday's explosion was the fourth failure of an Ariane 5 rocket in its 14-mission history. The failure is likely to halt Ariane 5 flights indefinitely.
Early investigations are likely to centre on the new components of the rocket.
UK space scientist Dr Andrew Coates, who lost experiments on the first Ariane 5 failure in 1986, said: "This seemed to happen just after the solid fuel boosters would have been jettisoned but still while the main stage was burning so the most likely explanation is that something went wrong with the main stage."
Comet question
The setback will now put an enormous question mark over Europe's upcoming science mission Rosetta, designed to put a lander on Comet Wirtanen.
The Rosetta craft was due to launch on the next Ariane 5 flight on 12 January. Its eight-year journey to the comet requires the probe to be swung around Mars once and Earth twice to get it in the right position to catch the comet.
"It has quite a narrow launch window and if it doesn't go in January I don't know when it will go quite frankly," UK space technologist Dr Chris Welch said.
He speculated the mission might have to risk a flight rather than see years of research and millions of euros go to waste.
Cruel reminder
The Ariane 5 launcher lost on Wednesday was carrying a double payload: a Hotbird TM7 for the European telecoms consortium Eutelsat, and Stentor, an experimental communications satellite for the French space research institute CNES.
The debris would have fallen into the Atlantic Ocean. The satellites were likely to have been insured.
The boss of Arianespace, Jean-Yves Le Gall, immediately apologised to his two customers.
"At this stage it is too early to give precise reasons for this failure," he said.
"Our job is difficult. It's at moments like this we are cruelly reminded of it," he added. "We have already known failures, we will know more."
TOPICS: Extended News; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: ariane; france; holdmafromage; kaboom
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I leave the comparisons between French rockets and their automobiles to you lot. ;)
Regards, Ivan
1
posted on
12/11/2002 5:11:48 PM PST
by
MadIvan
To: Delmarksman; Sparta; Toirdhealbheach Beucail; TopQuark; TexKat; Iowa Granny; vbmoneyspender; ...
Bump!
2
posted on
12/11/2002 5:12:04 PM PST
by
MadIvan
To: MadIvan
Coming from an Englishman...I would watch the automobile slams.
If Britannia rules the waves, why can't her cars cross a puddle?
3
posted on
12/11/2002 5:13:08 PM PST
by
Poohbah
To: MadIvan
Grenouilles Incompétentes!
4
posted on
12/11/2002 5:19:55 PM PST
by
LibKill
To: MadIvan
Ten minutes after the blast the french army surrendered.
;-}
To: MadIvan
No explanation for the loss has yet been given by officials from Arianespace... First thing I'd suspect would be that explosion, but hey, I'm just an amateur...
To: MadIvan
I would rather compare French rockets to their aircraft carriers. Did the prop fall of the rocket?
To: MadIvan
This is horrible. It's French and all, and their loss is the gain of their competitors, mainly Atlas, Delta, Russia, Japan, and China, in order of gross domestic space product, but this is bad news anyway.
To: deadlywithapen
,,, surely national pride would determine such a grand scale project would be staged on French soil rather than in their colonies. I guess this is quite a wise site to use on the basis of the outcome in this case.
To: MadIvan
The Ariane 5-ESCA blasted off from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana at 1921 (2221 GMT) local time and blew up three minutes later.
In a tersely worded press release, the French Government announced that the rocket had "surrendered to gravity"...
10
posted on
12/11/2002 5:36:36 PM PST
by
Itzlzha
To: Itzlzha
In a tersely worded press release, the French Government announced that the rocket had "surrendered to gravity"... Yes, the new Vichy class rockets would in future be pointed downward, so as not to resist the force any longer, but rather go with it, in an acceptance of the natural order. ;)
Regards, Ivan
11
posted on
12/11/2002 5:40:38 PM PST
by
MadIvan
To: MadIvan
So were the engines made by Citroen, Peugeot, or Renault.
Must've been Renault. It's the "Le Rocket!"
}:-)4
12
posted on
12/11/2002 5:43:18 PM PST
by
Moose4
To: MadIvan
"The Ariane 5 launcher lost on Wednesday was carrying a double payload: a Hotbird TM7 for the European telecoms consortium Eutelsat, and Stentor, an experimental communications satellite for the French space research institute CNES."
Goodness, the new French spy satellite communications bird didn't make it to orbit, who woulda thunk it...
13
posted on
12/11/2002 5:52:03 PM PST
by
Southack
To: MadIvan
Not the first time an Ariane-5 blowed up real good. Back around '94 they lost the first one because the guidance computers were loaded with Ariane-4 software.
To: MadIvan
LOL, and tip o' the hat, noble FReeper!
15
posted on
12/11/2002 5:59:03 PM PST
by
Itzlzha
To: Howlin; Ed_NYC; MonroeDNA; widgysoft; Springman; FreedomPoster; Timesink; AntiGuv; ...
"It blow'd up REAL good" ping!
"Hold muh beer 'n watch this!" PING....
If you want on or off this list, please let me know!
16
posted on
12/11/2002 6:02:34 PM PST
by
mhking
To: Poohbah
I just hate to see anything impede the space efforts.
Hmmmmm. France......4 for 14
Nasa shuttle 1 for ? how many?
17
posted on
12/11/2002 6:11:05 PM PST
by
tet68
To: KarlInOhio
Yes, I heard about the brandy-new French aircraft carrier dropping its 13 ton prop; it had to be towed back to port. Those morons can't build a car that's marketable in the USA. Well, then again, those arrogant pricks hate our guts after we defended them in two World Wars. Besides, why do they want to put a lander on a flippin "comet?" Those people are hopeles twits.
18
posted on
12/11/2002 6:17:11 PM PST
by
Cobra64
To: deadlywithapen
Ten minutes after the blast the french army surrendered. Only because it took ten minutes to change their underwear.
The Maginot Line of technology.
To: tet68
Hmm....
And that Russia rocket went down recently, and then that was followed by the Russian rocket mis-launching a Euro satelite... wasn't that a "communications" sat also? They ended up ditching it in the Pacific because it attained the wrong orbit.
The first of those two Russian rocket failures was attributed to "outside forces", read, sabotage. Could this be also? I can hardly imagine the borders of French Giuana [sic, I'm sure] being secure.
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