An unmanned Antares rocket explodes seconds following liftoff from a commercial launch pad on Virginia’s eastern seaboard, ahead of a Russian rocket which launched without a hitch.
No injuries were reported following the first catastrophic launch in Nasa’s commercial spaceflight effort.
The accident at Orbital Sciences Corporation’s launch complex at Wallops Island was sure to draw criticism over the space agency’s growing reliance on private US companies in this post-shuttle effort.
Nasa is paying billions of dollars to Orbital Sciences and the SpaceX company to make station deliveries, and it is counting on SpaceX and Boeing to start flying US astronauts to the orbiting lab as early as 2017.
Footage posted on YouTube by a pilot, showed the fireball from 3000ft. Channel 4 News cannot independently verify the video:
Nasa spokesman Rob Navias said there was nothing on the lost flight that was urgently needed by the six people living on the space station.
The Cygnus cargo ship was loaded with 5,000lbs of experiments and equipment and the Russian Space Agency was proceeding with its own supply run today.
.@OrbitalSciences team is executing its contingency procedures, securing the site & data, including all telemetry from the Antares & Cygnus.
— NASA (@NASA) October 28, 2014
Before launch @OrbitalSciences team wasn’t tracking any issues. No injuries have been reported & all personnel around launch site accounted.
— NASA (@NASA) October 28, 2014
If people find debris in the vicinity of the launch tonight, please stay away & call the Incident Response Team at 757-824-1295.
— NASA (@NASA) October 29, 2014
Russian #ISScargo ship safely in space toward #ISS with:
1,940 lbs propellant
48 lbs oxygen
57 lbs air
926 lbs water
2,822 lbs supplies
— NASA (@NASA) October 29, 2014
NASA said an investigation has been launched following the incident. Executive vice president of Orbital Science, Frank Culbertson, told a news conference: “We want to express our disappointment that we were not able to fulfill our obligation to the International Space Station program and deliver this load of cargo especially to the researchers who had science on board, people that were counting on various hardware and components that were going to the Station.
“It’s a tough time to lose a launch vehicle like this and its payload, but not as tragic as losing a life associated with it, so we’re very happy to report that there were no injuries and safeguards, both in flight and on the ground, worked as they should have”.