The upper stage of the Angara A5 rocket, called the Perseus, will make an uncontrolled entry into the Earth's atmosphere on Wednesday, January 5, Arstechnica reports.
On December 27, at 22:00 Moscow time, from the Plesetsk cosmodrome, Russia conducted the third test launch of the Angara-A5 heavy LV with the Perseus upper stage and with the overall mass model of the payload (2400 kg mass). The booster unit turned off 2 seconds after the second start of the engine.
Curiously, Russian officials and many media outlets noted the Angara missile test launch as a success. Even two days after the failed launch, the Russian state news service RT published an article with the headline "Space Truck: How the New Perseus Upper Stage Will Improve the Performance of the Angara-A5 Heavy Launch Vehicle." With the help of this modernized upper stage, RosKosmos hoped to abandon toxic fuel (unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH) and nitrogen tetroxide (AT) are used as fuel in the RB "Breeze-M"). Perseus, on the other hand, uses liquid oxygen and kerosene.
RB Perseus, tracked as IPM 3 / PERSEY, is now well below 200 km and is likely to make an uncontrolled entry into the Earth's atmosphere on Wednesday or Thursday. Let's hope he does it over the ocean.
Jonathan McDowell: IPN / Persei, has a mass of about 20 tons including fuel (about 3 to 4 tons dry weight). It is expected to make an uncontrolled fall between 13:30 UTC and 23:30 UTC on January 5 (16:30 UTC on January 5 - 02:30 UTC on January 6).
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