Russia is moving forward in its attempts to understand and remedy the two setbacks it suffered yesterday — the failure of Progress M-26M to boost the International Space Station’s (ISS’s) orbit and the failure of a Proton-M rocket that destroyed Mexico’s MexSat-1 communications satellite.

A second attempt at the ISS orbit reboost will be made tonight (May 17) beginning at 8:30 pm EDT (May 18, 03:30 Moscow Time) according to Russia’s official news agency TASS.  The Progress M-26M spacecraft that is attached to the ISS was supposed to raise the ISS orbit by 2.8 kilometers yesterday (Moscow Time, Friday evening EDT) by firing its engines for about 15 minutes.  The routine operation failed, however, because the engines did not ignite. 

Separately, Roscosmos head Igor Komarov will chair the Russian State Commission investigating the failure of a Proton-M rocket yesterday.  The Proton-M’s third-stage failed 497 seconds into the launch; it, the Briz-M upper stage and MexSat-1 fell back to Earth from an altitude of 161 kilometers.  Russian authorities searched the Baikal region of Russia for debris that might have survived, but most burned up during reentry.

Mexican telecommunications officials, the customer for this commercial launch brokered through International Launch Services (ILS), were philosophical about the loss of their satellite, which was fully insured.  They remain confident they will be able to provide the services promised by the MEXSAT system once the next satellite in the series (called Morelos-3 or MexSat-2) is launched later this year. That launch will be on an Atlas V from Cape Canaveral provided by Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services.

The State Commission is charged with finding out what went wrong and making recommendations on who to hold responsible.  Komarov replaced Oleg Ostapenko as head of Roscosmos in January after Ostapenko was relieved of duties because of other failures, the latest in a series of Roscosmos directors and industry officials to lose their jobs.  Komarov is the fourth Roscosmos director since NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden was sworn into office in 2009.

The Proton failure is another blow to Russia’s once-solid reputation for reliable launch vehicles, one more in a growing list of failures of several models of Russian rockets since December 2010 that has shaken confidence in the Russian space industry.

The January reorganization put Komarov in charge not only of the Roscosmos space agency, but of the Russian space industry, combining the two jobs into one.  He now must solve three anomalies at once — the April 28 Soyuz 2.1a launch failure that doomed the Progress M-27M cargo spacecraft and yesterday’s failures of the Progress M-26M ISS reboost and the Proton-M launch.

In a press conference following the failed launch attempt of Mexico’s MexSat-1 on Saturday, leaders of Mexico’s Secretariat of Communications and Transportation (SCT) celebrated the government’s foresight in acquiring comprehensive launch insurance, allowing the government to recover 100 percent of its investment in the development and launch of the satellite.

Boeing-built MexSat-1 (Centenario) was destroyed when a Russian Proton-M rocket launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on May 16, 2015 failed at 497 seconds after launch. International Launch Services (ILS) is the provider for Proton-M launch services.

The second of a planned constellation of three satellites for fixed and mobile communications called the MexSat system, Centenario was designed to meet national security and civil communication needs, including emergency services, tele-education, and tele-medicine. The first satellite in the constellation, MexSat-3 (Bicentenario), was successfully launched in December 2012.  According to an SCT press release, the third satellite, Morelos 3, is slated for an October 22, 2015, launch from Cape Canaveral through a service provided by Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services.

During the press conference Gerardo Ruiz Esparza, Secretary of Communications and Transportation, emphasized that the key benefit of having these satellites is not being in the space age, but having the satellite services. For the country to expand in this high-technology area, Mexico will need to learn to live with its inherent risks, he added. SCT’s foresight in fully covering the satellite through private insurance means there is “no loss” for the government of the republic. Ruiz Esparza added that with the upcoming launch of the Morelos 3 satellite, the services that Centenario would have provided are “practically guaranteed.”

Mexico invested an estimated $400 million in Centenario, $90 million of which covered the launch service. Ruiz Esparza was asked to name the amount spent in insurance coverage, a figure he said he did not have on hand and would hesitate to share given the ongoing investigation. In response to a question about the selection of ILS as a launch provider despite the recent issues with the Proton rockets, Ruiz Esparza explained that the service was contracted in February 2012 and that rescinding on that contract would have led to a significant penalty of around $60 million.

A video of the press conference (in Spanish) is available on YouTube.

Editor’s note: English translations provided by Laura Delgado.

Russian space experts continue to try to determine exactly what went wrong when Progress M-27M and its Soyuz 2.1a rocket separated on April 28.  Telemetry data reportedly are not enough to solve the mystery.

Russia’s official Tass news agency quotes an unnamed Russian space industry source as saying that “the telemetry data are not enough” and members of the State Commission investigating the incident are going to the companies that manufactured various components to inspect others from the same batches to try and recreate whatever went wrong.

Roscosmos and NASA indicated earlier this week that the investigation would finish by May 22, but Tass reported today that may slip.  “True, some findings may be presented by May 22,” it quotes the industry source, but “specialists will keep working at individual enterprises after that date.”

Progress M-27M was launched on April 28, but something went wrong when it separated from the third stage of its Soyuz launch vehicle that left both of them in incorrect orbits and the robotic cargo spacecraft spinning.   Control of the spacecraft was lost and it reentered over the Pacific Ocean on May 7 Eastern Standard Time (May 8 Moscow Time).  Initial speculation that the third stage exploded was ruled out in a preliminary report from the State Commission earlier this week. Roscosmos said on May 12  that determining the cause would require in depth computational and theoretical studies as well as modeling.

Russia, NASA and the other International Space Station (ISS) partners agreed on Tuesday to a revised schedule of crew and cargo flights to and from the ISS.  The return of Soyuz TMA-15M with three ISS crew members, planned for May 13, will wait until early June and the launch of their replacements was delayed from May 26 to July 24.   A different version of the Soyuz rocket is used for transporting crews to the ISS. 

The revised schedule calls for accelerating the next launch of a Progress cargo mission from August 6 to early July.   Progress M-27M was the second of four planned Progress launches to the ISS this year.  It was carrying three tons of food, fuel and other cargo.  NASA says that the loss of the spacecraft is not affecting U.S. operations on ISS, but Roscosmos has not indicated whether its crew activities are impacted.  

In addition to Russia’s Progress, ISS is resupplied by two U.S. commercial cargo vehicles — SpaceX’s Dragon and Orbital ATK’s Cygnus — and Japan’s HTV.  A Dragon is currently attached to ISS and three more launches are scheduled this year.  An HTV launch is planned for August and a Cygnus is expected by the end of the year.   NASA said on Tuesday, however, that the schedule of launches for the rest of the year remains under review.

NASA refers to Progress M-27M as Progress 59 because it is the 59th Progress to service the ISS, but many more Progress missions have been conducted since the first was launched in 1977.  Progress cargo ships supported the Soviet/Russian space stations Salyut 6, Salyut 7 and Mir before ISS.

NASA and its partners in the International Space Station (ISS) program decided today to extend the mission of three ISS crew members who were supposed to return to Earth tomorrow and postpone the launch of their replacements. The schedule change was prompted by the failure of Russia’s robotic Progress M-27M spacecraft last week.

Progress M-27M reentered over the Pacific Ocean on May 7 Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) and Roscosmos proposed changes to ISS crew and cargo flights at that time.  NASA announced today agreement among all the partners to the revised schedule, though exact dates have not been determined.  The ISS is a partnership among the United States, Russia, Canada, Japan, and 11 European countries working through the European Space Agency (ESA).

NASA’s Terry Virts, ESA’s Samantha Cristoforetti and Roscosmos’ Anton Shkaplerov were scheduled to return to Earth on their Soyuz TMA-15 spacecraft tomorrow (May 13).  The exact date for their rescheduled return in early June will be determined later.  The launch of their replacements on Soyuz TMA-17M will be postponed from May 26 to late July.   The three other ISS crew members now aboard ISS are NASA’s Scott Kelly, and Roscosmos’ Mikhail Kornienko and Gennady Padalka.  Kelly and Kornienko are part of the first one-year mission aboard ISS and will not return until March 2016.  Padalka is currently scheduled to come home in September.

Progress M-27M was launched on April 28, 2015 EDT and immediately ran into trouble.  A malfunction at the time it separated from the third stage of its Soyuz 2.1a rocket left both in incorrect orbits and the Progress spacecraft spinning.  One theory is that the third stage exploded, debris punctured the spacecraft’s fuel line, and venting fuel put Progress into a spin.  Roscosmos said today that the State Commission investigating the accident will conclude its work by May 22.

Progress M-27M was the second of four planned Progress cargo missions to the ISS this year.  The next had been scheduled for August 6, but the new schedule will accelerate that by about a month.

The new plan is as follows:

• Return of Soyuz TMA-15M (Virts, Cristoforetti, Shkaplerov) in early June instead of on May 13
• Progress M-28M launch in early July instead of August 6
• Launch of Soyuz TMA-17M with Kjell Lindgren (NASA), Kimiya Yui (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) and Oleg Kononenko (Roscosmos) in late July instead of on May 26

NASA refers to Progress M-27M as Progress 59 because it is the 59th Progress to resupply ISS, but the Progress spacecraft has been in use by Russia since 1977 so there have been many more flights than that.  It was carrying three tons of food, fuel and other supplies for the ISS crew, but NASA insists that U.S. operations are not affected by the failure.  

A U.S. SpaceX Dragon cargo craft is currently attached to the ISS, and three more are scheduled this year.  Japan’s HTV cargo spacecraft is scheduled for launch in August and the U.S. Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo spacecraft is expected to be launched by the end of the year.  NASA said, however, that all of the dates for the remaining flights to ISS this year are under review.