Disaster at Tyuratum

BEFORE the downfall of Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviets boasted that the first American to land on the moon would find a Russian there to welcome him. As the third and fourth American astronauts walked on the lunar surface, no Russian had yet ventured more than a few hundred miles into space. The prospects for an imminent Soviet manned lunar mission dimmed even further last week when it was revealed that the Russian space program had recently been struck by a major disaster.

U.S. space scientists had long expected the launch of a new Russian super rocket, a vehicle with a thrust of 10 million pounds (compared with the Saturn 5's 7.5 million pounds) that would put the Russians firmly back into the space race. Spy-in-the-sky satellites had actually photographed the monster rocket on its launch pad, and former NASA Administrator James Webb had spoken of its existence. But last summer, according to U.S. intelligence sources, a prototype of the giant booster exploded on the launch pad at the Tyuratum space complex in Central Asia, killing a number of technicians.

Soyuz Failure. The big booster was apparently designed for at least one of three alternative missions: 1) a direct landing on the moon by two cosmonauts, 2) the launch of an unmanned lander that would scoop up lunar material and return it to earth, or 3) the launch of major components of a manned orbiting platform. But the accident delayed further tests of the rocket. The lofting of three manned Soyuz shots last month, for example, apparently fell short of its goal. Two of the craft were equipped with docking collars, but failed to link up. Why? According to Aviation Week & Space Technology, a major component of the planned space station--its large central core--never got off the ground. Reason: no super rockets were available to launch it.

U.S. intelligence learned of the mishap through ELINT (for electronic intelligence). Deployed on the ground, aboard reconnaissance aircraft, or inside ferret-type electronic satellites, ELINT's sensors can easily detect large explosions, even at great distances, from the electromagnetic disturbances that they cause in the atmosphere. If added proof of the Soviet troubles is needed, the Russians themselves have indirectly provided it. The chief of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, Mstislav Keldysh, last month unexpectedly announced that the Russian effort to land men on the moon had been indefinitely delayed.

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