Iran to put Persian cat into space...... 'To Boldly Go Where no Persian Pussy went before'?

Iran to put Persian cat into space...... 'To Boldly Go Where no Persian Pussy went before'? (HD).

                

Iran has settled on a Persian cat as the best candidate for its latest trial for a manned space mission it hopes to make by 2020, state media reported Monday.

The feline would be following in the footsteps of a menagerie of dogs and monkeys who were among the early stars of the US and Soviet space programmes in the 1960s.

But the announcement of its planned foray into the atmosphere aboard Iran's Kavoshgar satellite carrier prompted an outcry from animal rights groups.

Top space official Mohammad Ebrahimi told the state IRNA news agency that the mission could go ahead by March next year but previous launch dates have been put off without official explanation.

Ebrahimi said the Persian cat was the favoured candidate for the mission after tests had been conducted on a number of animals.

His announcement drew an angry response from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

"Iran's archaic experiment... is a throwback to the primitive techniques of the 1950s," the animal rights group's spokesman Ben Williamson said.

"European and US space agencies stopped sending animals into space not only because it is unethical but also because they turned out to be poor models for the human experience and because superior, more scientific non-animal methods of study are now available." Iran in January claimed to have successfully launched a live monkey into space and have it land safely back on Earth.

The claim was disputed, however, when at an official press conference a different monkey appeared to be presented to the media.

Iran's first attempt to send a monkey into space failed in September 2011.

Iran, which first put a satellite into orbit in 2009, has previously sent a rat, turtles and worms into space.

Iran's space programme has prompted concern among Western governments, which suspect it is cover for an attempt to master the technology that would be required to deliver a nuclear warhead.

Iran denies any such ambition.

The Persian is the most popular breed of feline in the United States, according to the Cat Fanciers' Association.

It draws its name from the historic name for Iran, where it has a recorded history dating back centuries before the time of Christ.

Second Iranian Shahrud space-launch centre revealed.

Detail of Sharud site [source: Norbert Brugge]

Second Iranian Shahrud space-launch centre revealed.HT: UskowiOnIran.

According to IHS Jane's 360:

The [Shahrud] site discovered by IHS Jane's is 165 km to the northeast of the existing Semnan space centre and 40 km southeast of the city of Shahrud. Construction started between May and September 2010 - around the same time that the expansion at the Semnan site began - and now extends over an area of approximately 100 km 2.

Like Semnan, the Shahrud facility has a launch tower that is approximately 23 m high, suggesting the two sites duplicate the ability to launch the Simorgh or even larger rockets.

However, there are significant layout differences: the Shahrud facility's 140x200 m pad is far larger and it has a single 125 m-long rocket exhaust shaft, rather than two. Its 62x47 m horizontal rocket checkout facility is also smaller than the 100x50 m one at Semnan.

It is [...] likely that [Iran's  three space center] sites reflect the scale of Iran's ambitious space programme, which plans to launch constellations of communications, surveillance and weather satellites in the coming years. A manned-space mission has also been talked about.

The Semnan facility has been launching SLVs eastwards, so they benefit from the Earth's rotation to gain additional altitude. A facility at Chabahar would presumably launch rockets southwards over the Indian Ocean, which would be useful for putting surveillance satellites into polar orbits.

With all this activity planned, it would make sense for Iran to build a new facility dedicated to testing its next generation of long-range, solid-fuel ballistic missiles. The Shahrud facility would be well-suited to this role. The area has a history of involvement in Iran's ballistic missile programme, the new facility's buildings are spread out to minimise the risk of sympathetic explosions resulting from accidents, and there does not appear to be a liquid-fuel storage area.

Its orientation suggests it would launch towards the south-south-east, meaning large amounts of telemetry data could be gathered as missiles fly over Iranian territory. The rocket stages would fall inside Iran and the final stages would come down in the Indian Ocean.

There are a number of possible explanations for this identified site, including:

a) It is related to Iran's ambitious space program, in general, which under the  administration sought the relatively lofty goal of putting an astronaut in earth orbit.

b) It is related to Iran's ballistic missile research and development. Iran's solid-fueled ballistic missiles such as the Sejjil range of MRBMs (and potentially further developed missile types) are reportedly under-tested.

It will be interesting to see if Iran's space program will be accorded the same level of priority under the Rouhani administration, which even under the later days of the preceding administration appeared to be behind schedule possibly due to the adverse effects of U.S. led sanctions being applied against the country.