Soyuz-U-PVB | Foton-M No. 1
Foton-M No.1 was a mission by the European Space Agency aboard a Russian Soyuz-U rocket that failed to launch successfully. The spacecraft's payload consisted of 44 experiments prepared by the European Space Agency, Fluidpac, BIOPAN-4, Telescience Support Unit, and others. Investigation found that the most likely cause of the failure was debris being ingested into the Blok D hydrogen peroxide pump, cutting off the supply of lubricant to the turbopumps. This was the first failure of an R-7 launch vehicle in the first two minutes of launch since 1988.
Mission Details
- Launch date: October 15, 2002 at 06:20 PM UTC
- Launch vehicle: Soyuz-U-PVB
- Operator: Russian Space Forces
- Launch site: Plesetsk Cosmodrome, Russian Federation
- Mission type: Earth Science