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Brazilian space launch disaster
The 2003 Alcântara VLS accident was an accident during the Brazilian Space Agency's third attempt to launch the VLS-1 rocket, which was intended to launch two satellites into orbit. The rocket ignited on its launch pad at the Alcântara Launch Center, killing 21 people. It is officially the fourth deadliest space exploration related disaster in history.
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The 2003 Alcântara VLS accident was an accident during the Brazilian Space Agency's third attempt to launch the VLS-1 rocket, which was intended to launch two satellites into orbit. The rocket ignited on its launch pad at the Alcântara Launch Center, killing 21 people. It is officially the fourth deadliest space exploration related disaster in history.
The rocket, proposed in 1979 had two launch attempts until the accident: one in 1997, which ended up in the Atlantic Ocean due to the failure of one of the first stage engines to start and another in 1999, destroyed remotely due to a flame penetrating the top of the second stage block after takeoff.
In 2000, according to Manchete magazine, the ECHELON surveillance system allegedly engaged in industrial espionage against VLS systems. The following year, when the launch was still scheduled for 2002, the Ministry of Science tripled the program's funding and the CTA conducted successful tests of the VLS engines.
In August 2002, the Official Gazette of the Union published the contract awarded to Villares Metals S/A for “heat treatment services on the engine casing” of the VLS-1 V03 for R$ 757,812.00 (U$ 246244.72). The following month, when the final electrical and electronic system tests were being conducted in São José dos Campos, the launch was expected to take place in the first half of December, but in November 2002, the third launch had been postponed from December 2002 to March 2003.
In February 2003, Abril Service Ltda. was contracted to machine the engine housings. In April, the Minister of Science Roberto Amaral appointed Luiz Bevilacqua as president of the AEB, and in a speech he stated that the government would seek to consolidate the Alcântara Launch Center and complete the VLS project during the four years of the Lula administration. In an interview with Valor Econômico that same month, Bevilacqua indicated that the launch would take place within the next two months. The following month, the AEB and the Aerospace Technical Center announced that the launch would take place in August 2003. It was then set for August 25, 2003.
Besides being the third flight of the VLS-1, the operation, which began on July 1, 2003, and was scheduled to last 60 days, had as objectives the launch of the satellites UNOSAT and SATEC in to orbit; verify the CLA's ability to perform type launches and the use of the CLBI as a tracking station. The Satec, valued at R$ 500,000, used spare parts from other programs, had a service life of six months, weighed 65 kg, was 66 cm wide and deep, and 61 cm tall; developed by INPE, its objective was to test the technological equipment on board the rocket; Unosat, developed by the University of Northern Paraná with support from AEB, among others, was intended to be Brazil's first nanosatellite. V03 aimed to place them in a circular orbit at 15° and 750 km. The VLS-1 was valued at U$ 7 million.
The transportation of materials for V03 started on August 23, 2002 and stopped on April 16, 2003. The operation was restarted on July 1, an inspection the next day found no problems, and the satellites were transported on the 30th. Tribuna da Imprensa reports that the launch was delayed three times, including in April and May, due to, among other problems, flaws in the protection of the rocket "cluster." After several assembly operations, the accident occurred on August 22, 2003.
On August 17, two launch simulations took place, which led to the launch being scheduled for the 25th. Colonel Serre reports that there was no pressure to rush the launch and disregard safety regulations, a view expressed by the then-Minister of Defense, José Viegas, after the accident. However, a report by Agência Brasil on August 20 states that the date of the 25th was not yet 100% confirmed. A few days before the accident, an Air Force intelligence team was sent to the Alcântara Space Base to investigate possible disruptions to the launch plan. One of the tests conducted involved measuring radio waves in the days leading up to the launch, and nothing suspicious was detected in the region. The final phase of testing involved about 700 people at the Launch Center.
The accident occurred three days before the scheduled launch date, at 1:26:06 pm (Brasília time) on August 22, 2003, between frames 26 and 27 recorded by the Closed Circuit TV of the Mobile Integration Tower, with professionals spread across the five floors of the tower. At the time of the accident, the rocket weighed 50 metric tons, 90% of which was solid fuel, ammonium perchlorate.
An unplanned ignition, which began in a first-stage engine that caught fire after ignition, destroyed the launch vehicle while it was on the CLA launch pad. The other three engines, each containing more than 7,000 kilograms of solid propellant, did not fire. 21 people died due to the ignition of a first stage engine. It took about eight seconds before the tower was enveloped by smoke and gases heated up to 3,000 °C. The mobile tower stood upright for five minutes, collapsing at 1:31.
Survivors reported the noise of at least one booster running and several loud bangs. Amauri dos Santos Conceição, a safety technician at the base, reports in his diary that he waited for the authorities to remove two visible bodies, and then stayed behind to try to extinguish the remaining fires and search for other survivors. He finished his duties at the control tower at 7:55 p.m. (BRT).
Due to the scale of the event, the dead were identified through a roll call and the remains were identified and sent to the IML on August 23, 2003. On the same day, the base was reopened to the press. An Estadão podcast reports that there was no checklist indicating who had entered the base and who was working on the rocket at the time of the accident. It took two days to locate the 21 victims: on the first day, 2 were recovered; on the second, 7; and on the third, 12 victims. In the first few days after the accident, the victims were listed as "missing." The remains were identified using personal belongings, dental records, and DNA testing.
At the same time that the accident occurred, the president of AEB Luiz Bevilacqua, was giving a press conference about the agreement signed between Brazil and Ukraine for the use of the Alcântara base. Being informed of the accident by journalists, he ironically replied "only if it's a party skyrocket". A few minutes later, an aide confirmed the incident with a note. At 3:15 p.m., the Space Agency published the Air Force's official statement. It was identified that the ignition process occurred prematurely, and thus the launch tower was not removed in time, which was the main cause of the fire.
None of the activities, involving final adjustments to the equipment and the installation of video cameras, carried out that day posed any risk. However, the number of people at the base was well above safety standards, which allowed for only six people to be present. The accident significantly delayed the Brazilian space program. According to the Air Force, there was no damage outside the launch area, and at first, Minister José Viegas confirmed 16 fatalities.
As an immediate response, President Lula called an emergency meeting at the Palácio do Planalto with Defense Minister José Viegas and decided that Viegas and Roberto Amaral, Minister of Science, would travel to Alcântara the following day. André Singer, spokesman of the Presidency, was the first to speak on behalf of the executive branch. Also on the 23rd, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a telegram to the Brazilian president expressing his condolences, and on the same day, the Air Force released the list of fatalities. Lula did not travel with his ministers because he was scheduled to attend the funeral of diplomat Sérgio Vieira de Mello. Three days later, during an international trip to Peru, President Lula spoke about the accident involving the journalists, after Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo opened the press conference by asking for a minute of silence for the victims. That same day, Ministers Viegas and Amaral, along with AEB President Bevilacqua, visited the CLA, where they paid their respects.
President Lula and Minister Viegas rejected the idea that the accident had occurred due to a lack of funding, while Brigadier General Hugo de Oliveira Piva, the architect of the VLS program, pointed to the program's financial constraints dating back to the Sarney administration, which has since seen the program's budget drop from $521 million to $285 million during the Fernando Henrique Cardoso administration, as the main cause of the accident, while also acknowledging the possibility of human error.
The funeral service for the 19 victims, held with full military honors on August 27, 2003, at the DCTA—with the last two being identified that same afternoon—was attended by the Governor of São Paulo, Geraldo Alckmin, President Luis Inácio Lula da Silva. Ministers José Viegas (Defense) and Roberto Amaral (Science and Technology), Senate President José Sarney, the government leader in the Senate, Aloizio Mercadante, and the president of the Space Agency, Luiz Bevilacqua. In total, about 1,500 people attended the funeral. The next day, the funeral for the last two victims took place.
The Military Police Inquiry was opened on August 26, 2003, and the Technical Investigation Commission was appointed on August 28, 2003. The investigation involved Russia at the request of the Ministry of Defense, in particular Brigadier Luiz Carlos Bueno, during his visit to Moscow as part of the Brazilian Air Force F X Program, when he requested three technicians and was responded to with the dispatch of six six technicians from the Russian Aerospace Agency. The Military Police Inquiry was led by Air Force Brigadier José Monteiro Guimarães and assisted by the Deputy Attorneys General of the Military Justice System, Péricles Aurélio Lima de Queiroz and Carlos Frederico de Oliveira Pereira. Carlos Frederico de Oliveira Pereira was replaced by Military Prosecutor Clementino Augusto Ruffeil Rodrigues in September 2003. Péricles Aurélio was later replaced by Deputy Attorney General Arilma Cunha da Silva.
The families of the victims have even called for an independent investigation, something that the then president Lula has not commented on, but he has announced that he would send a bill of R$ 100 thousand to compensate the victims' families, approved by the Chamber of Deputies in October of that same year, in addition to paying for scholarships for their children. In the end, the investigation was not independent, as it was led by Brigadier Marco Antônio Couto do Nascimento, deputy director of the CTA, including representatives from the Brazilian Society for the Advancement of Science. A Special Commission of the House of Representatives visited the base on October 20. The compensation was approved by the House on October 28, 2003. Despite evidence of French espionage in Maranhão, no evidence of sabotage was found. Allegations of sabotage made within the Air Force and by members of Congress went so far as to concern the Air Force Command, which believed this would bring the project into disrepute, despite acknowledging the presence of foreigners and spies in the area at the time of the accident.
In testimony before the Chamber of Deputies in September 2003, Ministers José Viegas Filho and Roberto Amaral announced that discussions regarding U.S. use of the Alcântara base had resumed, and they ruled out the possibility of electrical problems at the VLS. That same month, the Senate pledged its support for the continuation of the space program, and the president of the Brazilian Space Agency issued a letter to the agency's employees addressing the accident, on the same day that the ministers of Defense and Science announced the names of those who would serve on the investigative committee, and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva reaffirmed in a speech his intention to test the fourth prototype over the next three years.
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