Good timing

It was ironic that Bigelow Aerospace released photos of the Dnepr launch of Genesis 1 on the same day that another Dnepr lifted off from Baikonur. Unfortunately, that launch was a failure: the rocket crashed to earth shortly after liftoff, apparently when its first-stage engines shut down. Had Bigelow’s luck been a little different, it might have been their launch that failed, leaving them uncertain about the success of their design. As it is, their next launch, which had been scheduled for late this year, may be delayed, depending on how long the Dnepr is grounded for any investigation and what payloads remain in the queue ahead of it (at least two more Dnepr launches were on the manifest between Wednesday’s failure and the Genesis 2 launch late this year, making this an unusually active year for the refurbished ICBM.)