Better luck next time for solar sail

The unmanned solar sail spacecraft Cosmos 1is most likely lost. The spacecraft was launched from a Russian submarine in the Barents Sea on June 21. Once deployed by a rocket, this spacesraft was to be the first to use its eight-panel solar sail to catch the gentle push of the steady flow of particles from the sun (the solar wind) to propel it through space at high speeds. The project was organized by The Planetary Society, an independent and privatley-funded space research organization. It is still uncertain whether the spacecraft is adrift in an unknown orbit or has crashed to earth.