chief Aleksandr Chayko barely survived a blast that killed his son-in-law.
asserted
that → survive → law
Chayko, who turned 55 in the last week of July, was reportedly having a belated birthday party on August 1 at a high-end Italian restaurant in central Moscow.
uncertain
who → turn → Moscow
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asserted
Trump → woo → August
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asserted
drones → shut → airspace
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But the celebration was cut short, as an unidentified woman carrying a homemade bomb tried to enter the restaurant.
asserted
woman → mean → restaurant
She was stopped by a security guard, according to Russia.
uncertain
She → stop → Russia
The explosive in her bag detonated, killing at least five people.
asserted
explosive → detonate → people
The Kremlin did not confirm the casualties, but blamed the attack on the “bloody tentacles” of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government.
asserted
Kremlin → confirm → government
Kyiv has not commented on the attack.
asserted
Kyiv → comment → attack
Russia’s space programme in the firing line
Chayko helped lead Russia’s intervention in Syria and commanded Russian forces north of Kyiv in early 2022.
asserted
Chayko → help → 2022
Ukraine has accused him of war crimes.
asserted
Ukraine → accuse → crimes
In May, President Vladimir Putin appointed him commander-in-chief of the RAF that controls the military component of Russia’s space programme.
uncertain
that → appoint → programme
The RAF’s satellites and ground-space facilities have been used for gathering intelligence, navigation, and supporting the coordination of ground troops and drone and missile attacks.
asserted
satellites → use → troops
These facilities are located mostly in western Russia, and new Ukrainian long-range drones and missiles are capable of striking them.
asserted
drones → locate → them
“Key factories are few, and they all are within the reach of Ukrainian missiles,” Nikolay Mitrokhin, a researcher with Germany’s University of Bremen, told Al Jazeera.
asserted
Mitrokhin → tell → Jazeera
“These attacks may result – and certainly will – in the problems with all of Russia’s space programme, including specifically civilian and international programmes,” he said.
uncertain
he → result → programmes
In late June, Ukrainian drones hit the giant space communications centre in the leafy, tranquil town of Dubna outside Moscow that managed reconnaissance satellites and processed military data.
asserted
that → hit → data
The strike damaged a 32-metre (105-foot) satellite antenna, hardware modular complexes, central control consoles and technical buildings.
asserted
strike → damage → antenna
“Our long-range sanctions against Russia for this war once again reached the Dubna space communications centre,” Zelenskyy said on June 30.
asserted
Zelenskyy → reach → June
Russian authorities said an unspecified building in Dubna was damaged and a six-month-old baby died.
asserted
baby → say → Dubna
Ukrainian drones also struck three smaller space communication centres in western Russia and annexed Crimea.
asserted
drones → strike → Crimea
“These centres are very expensive, very labour-consuming from the viewpoint of construction,” Anatoly Zak, a United States-based author and one of the foremost experts on the Russian space programme, told Al Jazeera.
asserted
Zak → consume → Jazeera
“It’s very difficult to transfer their functions to another infrastructure” because they manage geostationary satellites “tied” to a certain location.
asserted
they → ’ → location
So far, there have been no signs that the satellites lost orbit or became unmanageable, but “behind the scenes there are for sure serious communication problems”, Zak said.
asserted
Zak → lose → scenes
Ukraine attacks ‘when there’s a fully-fuelled rocket on the launchpad’
asserted
Ukraine → attack → launchpad
On August 23, swarms of Ukrainian drones flew more than 1,800km (1,120 miles) to reach Russia’s northwestern Arkhangelsk region.
asserted
swarms → fly → region
Some 40 drones were downed, regional authorities claimed, but at least two reached the area near Plesetsk, Russia’s military cosmodrome, or spaceport, and launchpad for intercontinental ballistic missiles and rockets carrying military satellites.
asserted
two → down → satellites
No harm was done.
asserted
harm → do → ?
A day later, Roscosmos, the state-run space corporation, reported the successful launch of a rocket with unnamed “military satellites”.
asserted
Roscosmos → run → satellites
The timing of the Ukrainian attack – along with two more strikes earlier this year – was calculated to strike a booster rocket that had just been fuelled and lifted for takeoff.
asserted
that → calculate → takeoff
“There have been three attempts to air-raid Plesetsk, and not just air-raid, but air-raid at the moment when there’s a fully-fuelled rocket on the launchpad that is about to start,” Zak said.
asserted
Zak → raid → launchpad
The attempts were serious enough to be publicly reported to Putin.
asserted
attempts → report → Putin
“Our [Ukrainian] ‘friends’ did everything to make this launch not happen,” Dmitry Bakanov, head of the Kremlin-run Roscosmos space agency, told Putin in April.
asserted
Bakanov → do → April
At least a dozen drones are necessary to damage Plesetsk’s launch table or rocket assembly shop, according to Pavel Luzin, an analyst with the Jamestown Foundation, a think tank in Washington, DC.
uncertain
drones → damage → Washington
The military satellites launched from Plesetsk are part of the Rassvet (Dawn) satellite fleet designed to rival and replace Starlink satellite modems by Elon Musk’s SpaceX company, Moscow claimed.
asserted
Moscow → launch → company
The world’s most launched spaceship
Sputnik 1, the Earth’s first artificial satellite, was the size of a fitness ball, and had nothing but a radio transmitter and three silver-zinc batteries inside.
asserted
Sputnik → launch → transmitter
The “Sputnik moment” was the US’s realisation, after the Soviet Union launched the first satellite in 1957, that the USSR had taken the lead in space technology and science.
asserted
USSR → launch → technology
But Sputnik 1 was launched on a modified R-7 – the world’s first intercontinental ballistic missile, designed to carry a hydrogen bomb across continents.
asserted
Sputnik → launch → continents
The same rocket technology that could deliver a nuclear warhead into the US had been repurposed to put a satellite into orbit.
uncertain
that → deliver → orbit
The R-7 became a prototype of the Soyuz booster rockets, the world’s most launched spaceships that made Soviet and then Russian launches routine and precise, unlike US launches of space shuttles.
asserted
launches → become → shuttles
…and 17 more, not listed.
The Aporia
