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Source says Russian rocket crash caused by human error

The commission will report the results of the inquiry to the Russian government on May 29

MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/. The results of the work of the commission investigating the causes of the Proton-M carrier rocket crash that occurred on May 16 will be reported to the government on Friday, May 29, a Russian space and industry source told TASS on Monday.

"The commission will complete its work and report the results to the Russian government on May 29," the source said.

According to him, the emergencies commission working at the Khrunichev Centre (Proton manufacturer) has exposed a number of violations in the carrier rocket production. "This is, undoubtedly, a human error. The fault occurred in the rocket manufacturing process," he said.

He declined to name the exact cause of the accident, saying that it would be reported to the government first.

The Proton-M carrier rocket on May 16 failed to orbit the Mexican communications satellite MexSat-1 - a contingency occurred one minute before the planned separation of the third stage from the satellite and the booster. The satellite and the booster burned up in the atmosphere over Russia’s Trans-Baikal territory. The commission investigating the Proton rocket failure causes is head by head of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) Igor Komarov.

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