The US military recorded in space the explosion of the upper stage of the Russian rocket

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Russian Rocket Soviet Space Program launch.

As a result of explosion of fuel tank of acceleration block «Frigate-SB» in space remained 65 fragments. The 18th Space Control Squadron of the United States Air Force reported this in its Twitter account. This unit is responsible for detecting, identifying and tracing artificial objects in Earth orbit.

It is noted that no collisions with other objects were recorded. According to the American military, the fuel tank exploded between 7:02 and 8:51 Moscow time on May 8. The cause of the explosion is unknown, but it is not because of a collision with another object. Whether debris poses a threat to orbiting satellites is not specified. The press service of the state corporation «Roscosmos» does not yet comment on this incident.

Soyuz Rocket Diagram.

Let us recall, «Frigate-SB» is a modification of the «Frigate» acceleration block with dropped tank block. «Frigate-SB» is intended for medium and heavy class carrier rockets. These acceleration units were used for launching the Russian astrophysical observatory «Spectra-P» on the rocket «Zenith-3M» in 2011, as well as for sending in space 34 satellites of the British company Oneweb on the rocket «Soyuz-2.1b» this year.

In 2017, after the launch of the rocket-carrier «Soyuz-2.1b» from the site of the cosmodrome Oriental acceleration block «Frigat» was in the zone of absence of radar, and the meteorological satellite «Meteor-M» did not make contact. It was later announced that it had fallen into the ocean.