22 June 2021: US Media reports a failed Iranian space launch occurred on 12 June 2021. The US Space Command confirmed the attempt. A variety of commercial imagery satellites provided open source indications and warning in the days leading up to the launch. Another launch attempt may be imminent.
– Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, said it was likely the Simorgh rocket is a two-stage space launch vehicle using engines based on a North Korean design.
– “The failed launch attempt is the fourth consecutive failure of the Simorgh launcher,” said Lewis, author of an upcoming book on Iran’s space program. “Iran seems to be struggling with this specific system. Other Iranian rockets of different designs have been more successful.”
Critics of Iran see the satellite launches as a provocative step, since the rockets use technology similar to what is needed for intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). “The Iranians have a long history of conflating the commercial and the military,” said Bradley Bowman, senior director at the Center on Military and Political Power at the hawkish Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank. “Anything that Iran is doing in space I would be concerned about, because they are going to…use those same capabilities against us in a military conflict.”
– The June 12 launch attempt comes over one year after the country’s last attempt to put a satellite into orbit. In April 2020, Iran launched the Nour 01 military satellite into orbit after previous failed attempts to launch similar satellites. This move that revealed a military aspect to the country’s civil space program.
– Open source analysts first noted launch preparations on 6 June from an @Maxar image of the Imam Khomeini Spaceport which are normally associated with Iranian space launches.
– On June 6, there were more than a dozen vehicles at the horizontal checkout building — something that only happens before space launches and a normal indicator.
– Another pre-launch signature is specialized equipment at the mobile launch gantry including two specific vehicles and a mobile work platform that were present on the 6th.
– Given the indicators discovered on 6 June, analysts re-examined 1 June imagery from @planet and saw fuel containers, as well as a possible oxidizer container.
– On 20 June @planet imaged the site again. A support vehicle and the mobile work platform are back at the gantry and there is another load of fuel (and possibly oxidizer) on site.
– Additional @planet imagery seems to reveal scarring at the launch site that occurred between 18-23 June. There has been no additional reporting of a launch occurring after the 12 June attempt.
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