The commercial return to flight of the Proton rocket following its launch failure on 16 May may not take place until September, industry sources have said. One source told SatelliteFinance that based on the two previous groundings a September launch…
The commercial return to flight of the Proton rocket following its launch failure on 16 May may not take place until September, industry sources have said.
One source told SatelliteFinance that based on the two previous groundings a September launch seemed likely, although another argued that was a very conservative estimate at this stage in the investigation and it may be sooner.
In the wake of the failed launch, International Launch Services (ILS) is to form a failure review oversight board comprising company representatives, customers, insurers and technical experts to examine the crash and take steps to put the Proton back into service.
The ILS FROB will not convene until late June or early July as they must first wait for more comprehensive findings from Russian space agency Roscosmos and an action plan from the rocket’s manufacturer, Khrunichev.
The commission formed by Roscosmos concluded its initial investigation into the crash this week and determined that, as originally indicated, the rocket’s third stage caused the accident.
Roscosmos attributed the error in the rocket’s upper stage to a faulty steering engine which failed due to increased vibration loads. Khrunichev said that it has already identified three ways to improve the reliability of the component and expects to be able to deliver an action plan to the board in one month.
ILS declined to comment on when the rocket may be mission-ready again.
The failure was Proton’s sixth since the start of 2010, although only the second issue for a launch managed by ILS. The other failures were federal missions.
The satellite aboard the ill-fated Proton launch was the Mexican government’s Centenario spacecraft, one of three birds in an MSS project worth more than US$1bn and insured through Marsh. The constellation’s third satellite, Morelos 3, which has a payload virtually identical to Centenario, is slated to be launched by Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services this October.
Insurers react with rate rise
The failures of the Proton over the past couple of years has had a significant impact on the insurance rate that the rocket garners.
According to insurers, launch-plus-one rates for a plain vanilla satellite flying to GEO would now be around four times higher for a Proton than for an Ariane 5 and at least double those for a Falcon 9.
The rates had slowly been converging since the last failure back in May 2014 but this latest anomaly has meant that it will now be a considerable challenge for any operator seeking to insure a satellite that is due to be launched on the Russian rocket.
Inmarsat plays the waiting game
The crash has also had serious implications for Inmarsat’s Global Xpress system as ILS was set to launch the final bird for that three-satellite constellation this month.
Commenting on ILS’ latest failure last month, Inmarsat CEO Rupert Pearce said: “This is the third time our Global Xpress programme has suffered launch delays because of Proton launch failures.
“Although in the past, Proton has returned to flight within a few months of a launch failure, it will not be possible to determine the length of the delay in the launch of I-5 F3 until the cause of the Centenario launch failure is established.”
Following the Roscosmos commission’s initial findings this week Inmarsat said it would wait until the ILS board had completed its report before providing an update on when it might be able to launch F3.
Global Xpress was first announced in 2010 and originally scheduled to become operational last year, but repeated launch issues scuppered that plan.
If the latest Proton grounding causes a prolonged delay Inmarsat has a number launch slots with SpaceX starting mid-2016 it could fall back. Boeing is currently constructing an I-5 F4 backup satellite to be ready for a potential SpaceX launch in H2 2016, which Pearce described as giving Inmarsat “significant mission assurance in the case of any protracted delays in Proton’s return to flight, or a failed launch of I-5 F3.”.
The British operator has said the delay will have a small negative impact on 2015 revenue and earnings.
