Solar Sail Spacecraft Is Tested For Flight

ROCKET SCIENCE

Illustration of Cosmos 1.

Moscow (UPI) Mar 17, 2005
A solar-sail spacecraft is undergoing pre-flight testing, Russian media reported Thursday.

The unmanned spacecraft with eight triangular sail blades, each 16.5 yards long, is to be launched in April aboard a Volna rocket.

The launch will occur from a Russian submarine in the Barents Sea, Lidia Avdeeva, spokeswoman for the Lavochkin production and science association, told the Russian ITAR-TASS news agency.

Scientists will study the possibility of using a solar sail as a traction system and as a way to control the spacecraft during its orbit flight, she said.

"Technical solutions used in the probe can be a basis for future interplanetary expeditions," she said.

The launch of the spacecraft, called Cosmos 1, was planned for March but was postponed because of "the sheer volume of preparatory work," Avdeeva said earlier this year.

The spacecraft was built under a contract with the U.S. Planetary Society.

An attempt in 2001 to test a spacecraft with two sail blades failed because the craft failed to deploy from its booster rocket.

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ROCKET SCIENCE

Solar Sail Spacecraft Launch Postponed

Moscow (UPI) Feb 16, 2005
Russian space officials have delayed until April a test launch of a solar-sail spacecraft, local media reported Tuesday. The spacecraft, called Cosmos 1, is planned for launch on a Volna rocket from a converted SS-N-18 Russian submarine in the Barents Sea.

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