"Because the Apstar failure happened a few seconds later than Optus, the consequences were catastrophic. The vehicle was destroyed, and the falling wreckage landed on a village down-range of the launch site, killing at least 20 and perhaps as many as 120 people."
"First attempted launch of a new version in the Long March family. Began to experience an anomaly in attitude about 2 seconds after launch, pitching down and yawing to the right. It augured in nose down at T+22 seconds and exploded violently, utterly destroying the launcher and its payload. The Chief-Designer of the launch vehicle organised an analysis team on the same day of the accident. Interpretation and analysis of the telemetered data indicated that the crash was caused by a change in the inertial reference. The explosion killed six and injured 57. Two of the killed were senior engineers with CASC"
"The commission's conclusion echoed the opinion of Brazilian Defense Minister Jose Viegas, who admitted the shortage of funds was the root cause for the space tragedy although official report showed that the accident was caused directly by a short circuit inthe rocket systems. The commission said lack of investments in new equipment, security measures and training of the personnel working on the space program led to the tragedy. According to the government-appointed commission, the government budget on space program was reduced to 15.3 million US dollars in 2002 from 86 million dollars in 1998."
2. China: a rocket fell to the populated area after a failed launch. Hundreds of people were killed. The real number of casualties are unknown. The accident is partially covered up by Chinese government.
