The Breeze-KM Upper Stage that lifted off onboard a Rockot launch vehicle along with 3 military communications satellites on January 15, may have encountered a problem affecting the final de-orbiting.
Although there is no official information as to whether or not the stage was supposed to perform a final burn to achieve a reentry orbit following the payloads’ deployment, similar perigee lowering maneuvers have been conducted in all recent similar satellite launches. The maneuver, which is described on Eurockot’s website, would have consisted of a “final ignition of the main engine to reduce the orbit velocity and hence perigee for a rapid decay to re-entry” about 11 minutes after the spacecraft separation. Lowering the perigee of the orbit and therefore reducing the upper stage’s in-orbit time is part of the international orbital debris reduction policy.
After Eurockot declared the launch a success, placing all 3 Rodnik S satellites in the expected orbit at about 1500 km, the US Strategic Command’s Space Track website had shown 4 objects in the same path instead of 3. The fourth object has been identified as the Breeze-KM Upper Stage.
The possible failure, if confirmed, would open a new chapter in the recent difficult history of the Breeze Upper Stage family, that could likely affect the future Proton/Breeze-M missions causing further delays to both Rockot and Proton scheduled launches.
Below, a Rockot launch from Plesetsk.
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