Satellites of the group "Dauria Aerospace" do not get in touch (unfortunately, continued)

Domestic private astronautics in the news is marked not by some technical achievements, but by the rubric of scandals and investigations. The next round occurred in the history of the launch of the Soyuz-2.1a launch vehicle on July 14, 2017. This launch was marked by the launch of private domestic satellites into orbit. In the media, the event passed as “a new record for domestic cosmonautics in terms of the number of spacecraft simultaneously being launched into space” (73 vehicles). Unfortunately, this is almost the only positive news of this launch. Private vehicles, which were published on the GT - satellites of the group "Dauria Aerospace" and KA Mayak were lost.

The chain of preceding events is described in the article The satellites of the Dauria Aerospace group do not get in touch , which ended with the prediction of the line of development of events that were generally true:

Ahead, another Roscosmos lawsuit against Dauria Aerospace emerges, in which Dauria will defend the position of serviceability of its vehicles that have passed pre-flight tests and argue for force majeure circumstances - during the separation of your spacecraft, or during communication with them , or in the course of further activities, you have identified any deviations from the norm in their work. ”

Private traders insisted on the absence of their guilt, trying to link the failure with force majeure -

we assume that “Mayak” and other failed satellites, put into orbit with an approximate apogee of 600 km, failed because of the decomposition products of hydrazine from one or several liquid thrusters (LRE MT) C5.221.00-0 used in the reactive control system of the upper stage (RB) “Fregat”.

This version is described in detail on GT in the article Researching the Possible Causes of the Mayak Satellite Accident .

A few days ago, the story had a sequel. It seems that private traders could make a compromise by making new satellites, closing this question without aggravating the conflict. However, the development has received a version of the guilt "Roskosmos". And Roscosmos strikes back.
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On March 12, 2018, in Izvestia, the news was published "Roscosmos is demanding the return of money for non-working satellites"
Roscosmos insists that the manufacturer of two Dauria Aerospace nano-apparatuses is guilty of their malfunction and must return the budget funds in the amount of 290 million rubles paid for their manufacture. Representatives of Dauria Aerospace told several media about the pre-release statement from Roscosmos, demanding the return of all the money. In case of refusal to pay the state corporation expects to return the money through the court.

In the conclusion of the state commission to investigate the emergency situation with the ICA-N (a copy of the document is available from Izvestia), it is noted that the possible reason for the lack of communication with the satellites is the impact on the devices of “external factors”. At the same time, as indicated in the document, “a note was made on the functioning of the engine of the launch support system” of the upper unit “Frigate”. This unit was used to remove the payload on the required orbits after separation from the third stage of the Soyuz-2.1a rocket.
Judging by the telemetry transmitted to Earth, at the time of the separation of the nanosatellites and the Russian unit Mayak from the Frigate, fuel continued to flow into one of the engines of the upper stage. This engine was in close proximity to the MCA-N. Nevertheless, the state commission did not see a causal connection between this emergency situation and the subsequent lack of communication with nanosatellites. In conclusion, it is recognized that it is impossible to determine the source of "external factors" that led to the breakdown of MCA-N.

On March 14, the Roscosmos publication appeared in Kommersant denying the effect of a malfunction in the Fregat upper stage on the success of the mission - the answer of Roscosmos to Dauria Aerospace.

The publication reports that Roskosmos recognizes a malfunction in the upper stage, but the unit could not affect the operation of the spacecraft.

According to the Glavkosmos report, out of 24 spacecraft being launched in this orbit, only three spacecraft did not immediately transmit telemetry: 2 MKA-N and student Mayak. Glavkosmos confirmed that Dauria Aerospace had officially applied to the state corporation with a proposal to form an emergency commission due to the lack of communication with their devices.

Having considered the reporting materials and having studied the technical data, including the telemetry of the Fregat upper stage, Glavkosmos concluded that the creation of an emergency commission was not practical due to the fact that the emergency situation was not fixed.

On March 15, Roscosmos was reported by TASS - Roskosmos: Dauria Aerospace satellites were 1.5 km from the Frigate during an engine failure .

In the publication "Roskosmos" notes that the version of external impact on satellites put forward by Dauria Aerospace due to a malfunction of the engine of the upper stage is not true:

The separation of spacecraft MKA-N No. 1 and No. 2 and a number of other satellites (including Corvus-BC) in accordance with the cyclogram took place in the period of time (9180-9590 s) until the moment when the engine failure DT7 was detected (11440 s).

With the stated speed of the separation of the MCA-N declared by Dauria Aerospace, the distance to the Fregat upper stage during this time was more than 1.5 kilometers

Apparently, only legal proceedings are ahead of domestic private space exploration. And Roskosmos (Glavkosmos) will for a long time renounce joint projects with domestic private companies.

PS Events are actively developing - 03/16/2018 Glavkosmos demanded an explanation for the payment of insurance for Landmapper satellites

Glavkosmos sent a request to the insurance company Starr Aviation and the customer company Astro Digital in order to obtain explanations on what grounds the insurance payment was made for Landmapper satellites, since the launch of the Soyuz-2 launch vehicle was officially recognized as successful, a representative of the state corporation told RIA Novosti "Roscosmos".

RIA Novosti ria.ru/space/20180316/1516541481.html

PPS Zelenyikot

In short: Roscosmos is lying. And with each new press release, new tales are added.

Next geektimes.ru/post/299093/#comment_10668677

PPPS 03/16/2018

Glavkosmos JSC considers the statements of the creators of the spacecraft Mayak claiming that the satellite stopped working due to external influence, a representative of the company acting as a subsidiary of the Roscosmos state corporation told RIA Novosti.

RIA Novosti ria.ru/space/20180316/1516543069.html

March 19th / TASS /. Malfunction in the engine of the upper unit “Frigate” occurred even before the separation of the spacecraft MKA-N manufactured by Dauria Aerospace, and not after, as Roscosmos claims. This was announced on Monday TASS spokesman for Dauria Aerospace Vitaly Egorov.

More on TASS:
tass.ru/kosmos/5045039

21 March
“According to the report of the S. A. Lavochkin NPO, which was drawn up by specialists from the Keldysh Center, Khimmash Design Bureau and the Russian Ministry of Defense, the research made it possible to reliably exclude the possibility of influence of leakage of propellant components on the spacecraft engine engine, and after. This did not affect and could not affect the process of launching the spacecraft, ”said the Russian Space Agency.