Mars 2MV-3 No.1 also known as Sputnik 24 in the West, was a

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

spacecraft, which was launched in 1962 as part of the

Mars program The Mars program was a series of uncrewed spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1973. The spacecraft were intended to explore Mars, and included flyby probes, landers and orbiters. Early Mars spacecraft were small, and launche ...

, and was intended to land on the surface of

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...

. Due to a problem with the rocket which launched it, it did not depart

low Earth orbit A low Earth orbit (LEO) is an orbit around Earth with a period of 128 minutes or less (making at least 11.25 orbits per day) and an eccentricity less than 0.25. Most of the artificial objects in outer space are in LEO, with an altitude never mor ...

, and it decayed several days later. It was the only Mars 2MV-3 spacecraft to be launched.

Launch

The spacecraft was launched at 15:35:15 UTC on 4 November 1962, atop a Molniya 8K78 carrier rocket flying from Site 1/5 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. About 260 seconds into the flight, the oxidiser pressurisation system malfunctioned, resulting in cavitation within the feed lines and turbopump. The same problem developed in the propellant feed lines thirty-two seconds later. Although the lower stages of the rocket were still able to place the upper stage and payload into a

, vibrations caused by either the cavitation problem, or a separate problem with the next stage, caused a fuse to become dislodged in the electrical system controlling the upper stage engine. This prevented the

Blok L Blok may refer to: *Blok (surname) *Blok (comics), the fictional superhero of the DC Comics universe *Blok M, downtown shopping area in Jakarta, Indonesia *Mega Bloks, plastic building blocks produced by Mega Bloks, Incorporated *The Vlaams Blok (D ...

upper stage igniting, leaving the spacecraft in its

parking orbit A parking orbit is a temporary orbit used during the launch of a spacecraft. A launch vehicle boosts into the parking orbit, then coasts for a while, then fires again to enter the final desired trajectory. The alternative to a parking orbit is ''di ...

. It decayed from orbit the next day. However, some debris remained in orbit until 27 December, and the upper stage

ullage motor Ullage motors (also known as ullage engines or ullage rockets) are relatively small, independently fueled rocket engines that may be fired prior to main engine ignition, when the vehicle is in a zero-g situation. The resulting acceleration causes ...

platform remained in orbit until 19 January 1963.

Designation

The designations Sputnik 31, and later Sputnik 24, were used by the United States

Naval Space Command The Naval Space Command (NSC) was a military command of the United States Navy and former component command of United States Space Command. It was headquartered at Dahlgren, Virginia, and began operations on 1 October 1983. Naval Space Command us ...

to identify the spacecraft in its

Satellite Situation Summary A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotope ...

documents, since the Soviet Union did not release the internal designations of its spacecraft at that time, and had not assigned it an official name due to its failure to depart

geocentric orbit A geocentric orbit or Earth orbit involves any object orbiting Earth, such as the Moon or artificial satellites. In 1997, NASA estimated there were approximately 2,465 artificial satellite payloads orbiting Earth and 6,216 pieces of space debri ...

References

{{Mars spacecraft Spacecraft launched in 1962 1962 in the Soviet Union Mars program Spacecraft which reentered in 1962 2MV

Launch

Designation

See also

References