Russia launched its Proton M rocket July 2, carrying three satellites for the GLONASS navigation system. However, liftoff ended seconds later with a dramatic failure. Image credit: Flickr.com

Russia launched its Proton M rocket July 2, carrying three satellites for the GLONASS navigation system. However, liftoff ended seconds later with a dramatic failure. Image credit: Flickr.com user Alexpgp

[Satellite TODAY 08-16-13] The ILS Failure Review Oversight Board (FROB) concluded its review on August 13. The board concurred with the conclusions of the Russian State Inter-Agency Commission on the root cause of the failure and the associated corrective action plan of the July 2, 2013 Proton M/Block DM mission failure with three Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS) satellites for the Russian Federal Government.

The members of the FROB agreed with the findings of the Russian investigation that the root cause of the failure was due to the improper installation of the three yaw angular rate sensors located on the Proton launch vehicle, which caused the vehicle to deviate from its flight path shortly after lift-off.

The ILS Proton return to flight mission will be the Astra 2E satellite for SES on September 15, 2013.