Posted: Fri, Jun 5, 2015, 5:01 PM ET (2101 GMT)
The loss of a Progress spacecraft launched in April was caused by an unforeseen interaction between the spacecraft and its upper stage, Russian investigators said this week. The Progress M-27M spacecraft started spinning out of control shortly after separating from the upper stage of its Soyuz-2.1a rocket. The Russian space agency Roscosmos said a "design peculiarity" between the spacecraft and upper stage caused the failure, but did not provide additional details beyond the "frequency-dynamic characteristics of the linkage." Roscosmos is planning to launch a new Progress spacecraft on an older variant of the Soyuz rocket in early July.
