As far as I can determine the Breeze-M used NTO and UDMH. I guess NTO is Nitrogen Tetroxide and UDMH is of course Unsymetrical Dimethyly hydrazine if my chemistry of 40 odd years ago is any good. Apparently the failure of this particular mission - Arabsat - was a foreign particle which blocked the oxidiser booster hydraulic pump. Recalling my amateur rocketry days this propellant combination is hypergolic - ie they ignite spontanteously so I guess what happened here is that the booster started leaking one of the propellants which came into contact with the other one so "wham". I think nitrogen tetroxide is also highly corrosive. I actually tried to make it in the University laboratory - extremely stupid because the fumes attack lungs etc- obviously my attempt failed - a similar experience when I tried to make nitro-glycerine -- just as well I changed profession from chemist to astronomer! Cheers Greg . ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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