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- The crash of a
Russian Proton rocket launched from Baikonur
in Kazakhstan was the
latest in a series of accidents since space exploration
began in 1957
with the launch of the Soviet Sputnik satellite.
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- The following is a chronology
of some key space incidents:
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- January 1967 - Three U.S.
astronauts, Virgil Grissom, Roger Chaffee and Edward White, die in a
"flash
fire" aboard Apollo 1 during a simulated launch at
Cape Canaveral.
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- April 1967 - Soviet cosmonaut
Vladimir
Mikhailovich Komarov is first man to die in a space mission when
a
parachute on his spaceship failed on re-entry and the ship crashed to
Earth.
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- July 1971 - Three Soviet
cosmonauts
die during re-entry after 24 days in an orbiting space laboratory,
a
record endurance flight at that time.
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- March 18,
1980 - Fifty technicians
die at Russia's
Plesetsk Cosmodrome when a Vostok booster explodes while
being fuelled.
The incident is reported only in 1989.
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- January 28, 1986
- Seven
U.S. astronauts including a school
teacher die aboard the Challenger space
shuttle 72 seconds after
lift-off from Cape Canaveral.
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- April 18, 1986 - A Titan
missile believed to be carrying a military satellite explodes shortly
after
launch from the Vandenberg Air Force Base launch site in
California.
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- May 3, 1986 - A Delta rocket
carrying
a $57 million weather satellite explodes shortly after lift-off
from
Cape Canaveral.
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- Feb 22, 1990 - Western Europe's
36th
Ariane rocket, carrying two Japanese satellites, explodes less than
two
minutes after lift-off from Kourou, French Guiana.
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- Sep 7, 1990 - Part of a U.S.
Titan rocket falls from a crane and explodes
at Edwards Air Force Base,
sending flames 150 feet (45 meters) into the
air and killing at least one
person.
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- June 18,
1991 - A 46-foot
(15-meter) Prospector rocket
carrying 10 science experiments for the U.S.
space agency and several
universities is destroyed after veering off course
after launch from
Cape Canaveral.
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- Aug 2, 1993 - A Titan 4 rocket
believed to be carrying an expensive military spy satellite explodes after
lift-off from Vandenberg Air Force Base.
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- Dec 1, 1994 - Western Europe's
70th Ariane rocket crashes into the
Atlantic with the $150 million PanAmsat-3
telecoms satellite after
launch from Kourou, French Guiana.
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- Jan 26, 1995 - The Chinese-designed
Long March 2E rocket carrying a
telecommunications satellite explodes after
blast-off from Xichang in
southwest Sichuan province.
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- Oct 23, 1995 - An unmanned
Conestoga rocket whose satellite contained 14 scientific experiments
explodes
45 seconds after blast-off from a NASA facility in
Virginia.
-
- Feb 15, 1996 - A rocket carrying
an
Intelsat 708 communications satellite explodes soon after take-off from
China's launch site in Xichang.
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- May 20, 1996 - A Soyuz-U
booster rocket carrying reconnaissance satellites explodes 49 seconds
after
lift-off from Russia's Baikonur cosmodrome.
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- June 4, 1996 - Europe's Ariane-5
rocket explodes 40 seconds into its maiden
flight after blasting off from
the European Space Agency launch center
in French Guiana.
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- June 20, 1996 - A Soyuz-U
rocket carrying reconnaissance satellites explodes after lift-off at
Plesetsk
cosmodrome.
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- May 20, 1997 - A Russian
Zenit-2 booster rocket carrying a Cosmos military satellite explodes 48
seconds after launch.
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- August 12, 1998 - The U.S.
Titan rocket program is put on hold when a Titan 4A explodes soon after
lift off in one of history's most expensive space disasters. The cost of
the rocket and its spy satellite cargo was put at more than $1
billion.
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- August 27, 1998 - A Delta
3 rocket
carrying a U.S. communications satellite bursts into a $225 million
fireball, soon after blast-off from Cape Canaveral on its maiden
flight.
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- September 10, 1998 - A computer
malfunction brings down a Ukrainian rocket carrying 12 commercial
satellites,
minutes after blast off from Baikonur.
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- July 5, 1999 - A Russian
Proton-K heavy booster rocket launched from
Baikonur suffers a malfunction
which detached the engine and parts of
the booster, causing them to crash
onto the steppe. A 200-kg (440 lb)
chunk falls into the courtyard of a
private house. Kazakhstan briefly
closes Baikanur in a row with Russia
over clean-up costs and rent for
the base.
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- October 28, 1999 - A Russian
Proton
rocket carrying a communications satellite crashes shortly after
take-off from Baikonur.
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