He also indicated the problem involved failures of the first stage of the Antares rocket, powered by a refurbished Aerojet engine left over from the NK-33 program when the Soviet Union abandoned its moonshot.
“The asset stopped, there was some, let’s say, disassembly of the first stage, after which it fell to earth,” said Culbertson, in a deadpan description of an explosion that could be seen for miles and terrified observers.
“Their rocket honestly sounds like the punchline to a joke,” said Elon Musk, founder of rival SpaceX, in an interview in 2012. “It uses Russian rocket engines that were made in the 60s. I don’t mean their design is from the 60s — I mean they start with engines that were literally made in the 60s and, like, packed away in Siberia somewhere.”
