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Russian Space Agency: Solar Sail Attempt Fails


How a solar sail space craft could look in the future 22 June 2005 -- Russia's space agency said today the world's first solar sail space craft was lost due to the failure of a booster rocket during launch.

Vyacheslav Davidenko, a spokesman for Russia's space agency, says the booster failed 83 seconds after its launch from a Russian nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea. He said that means the solar sail craft was lost.

The space agency has launched a search mission to recover the debris.

U.S. scientists earlier today said that they thought they might have detected signals from the spacecraft.

The Cosmos-1 was designed to test possibilities of using the pressure of sunrays as a means of propulsion for spacecraft.

(Agencies)

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