Proton-M launch failure, July 2 2013. The accident happened because an crucial flight control system was installed upside down.
It gets better. The part in question was an accelerometer in the inertial guidance system, which was intended to detect changes in the rocket’s motion so that deviations from the flight trajectory could be corrected. Being a critical part, one might expect the manufacturer to make it difficult for the accelerometer to be installed in the wrong way.
Well, as it turns out, the manufacturer did make it so that the part could only be installed in one direction. When investigators recovered the guidance system from the wreckage, they found out that the accelerometer had been hammered into place by some assembly worker who apparently wanted to do way more work than was actually necessary to install it.
I don’t recall if they ever discovered whether it was deliberate sabotage or not, but given that this is Russia, I wouldn’t be surprised.
Proton-M launch failure, July 2 2013. The accident happened because an crucial flight control system was installed upside down.
It gets better. The part in question was an accelerometer in the inertial guidance system, which was intended to detect changes in the rocket’s motion so that deviations from the flight trajectory could be corrected. Being a critical part, one might expect the manufacturer to make it difficult for the accelerometer to be installed in the wrong way.
Well, as it turns out, the manufacturer did make it so that the part could only be installed in one direction. When investigators recovered the guidance system from the wreckage, they found out that the accelerometer had been hammered into place by some assembly worker who apparently wanted to do way more work than was actually necessary to install it.
I don’t recall if they ever discovered whether it was deliberate sabotage or not, but given that this is Russia, I wouldn’t be surprised.
There is a cosmonaut space suit that has been developed in Russia especially for the use by Orthodox church priests while their (possible) space trips.
Theocracy in Space! What new blasphemy will they uncover?
