Jonathan's Space Report 
No. 212               1994 Sep 29                 Cambridge, MA
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Shuttle
-------

Launch of Endeavour on mission STS-68 is due on Sep 30. Payload is a
Spacelab pallet with the Shuttle Radar Lab's SIR-C and X-SAR radars; an
MPESS pallet with the MAPS ozone monitor;  and five GAS Beam Adapter
mounted GAS cans: G-316, G-503, G-541, and two unnumbered cans with US
Postal Service commemorative stamps.

Discovery left Edwards AFB aboard Shuttle Carrier Aircraft 905
on Sep 26 and arrived at the Cape on Sep 27 after a stop at
Kelly AFB, Texas. Its next flight is STS-63, the Mir rendezvous
mission. Columbia is scheduled to fly to Palmdale next week
for refurbishment at the Rockwell plant.

Mir
---

Launch of the EO-17 crew to Mir is scheduled for Oct 3 at 2242 UT. Crew commander
is veteran cosmonaut Alexander Viktorenko of the Russian air force.
Flight engineer is Elena Kondakova of NPO Energiya. Cosmonaut-research
is Ulf Merbold of the European Space Agency. The crew will be launched aboard
Soyuz TM-20. The flight will mark the first time that a Russian woman has
formed part of a regular space crew (as opposed to being flown on a special
propaganda flight as 'the first woman to do x'.)

Launches
--------

Kosmos-2291 was launched on Sep 21. It is a geostationary satellite,
probably one of the Geyzer series for military communications.
On Sep 29 it was drifting west at 1 deg per day past 80 deg E longitude,
after a small braking maneuver on Sep 28. Orbit was 35853x  35886 km x 1.3 deg.

Kosmos-2292 was launched on Sep 27. The satellite is one of a series
launched infrequently into ellipical orbits, possibly for radar calibration
purposes. The launch vehicle was the Kosmos-3M 11K65M, built by PO Polyot
of Omsk and based on the Ukranian Yangel' bureau's R-14 IRBM missile.

    Kosmos-2292 class satellites
  Satellite    Launched     Orbit (km x km x deg)
  Kosmos-660   1974 Jun 18  397x1972 x 83.0
  Kosmos-807   1976 Mar 12  398x1973 x 83.0
  Kosmos-1238  1981 Jan 16  406x1958 x 83.0
  Kosmos-1263  1981 Apr  9  397x1970 x 83.0
  Kosmos-1508  1983 Nov 11  400x1966 x 83.0
  Kosmos-2098  1990 Aug 28  396x1976 x 83.0
  Kosmos-2292  1994 Sep 27  400x1953 x 83.0


Recent Launches
---------------

Date UT         Name            Launch Vehicle  Site            Mission    INTL.
                                                                           DES.

Aug 10 2305     Brasilsat B1  ) Ariane 44LP     Kourou ELA2     Comsat      49A
                Turksat 1B    )                                 Comsat      49B
Aug 11 1527     Kosmos-2287   ) Proton-K/DM2    Baykonur LC81   Navsat      50A
                Kosmos-2288   )                                 Navsat      50B
                Kosmos-2289   )                                 Navsat      50C
Aug 23 1431     Molniya-3       Molniya         Plesetsk LC43   Comsat      51A
Aug 25 1425     Progress M-24   Soyuz-U         Baykonur LC1    Cargo       52A
Aug 26 1200     Kosmos-2290     Zenit-2         Baykonur LC45   Recon       53A
Aug 27 0858     USA-105         Titan Centaur   Canaveral LC41  SIGINT      54A
Aug 27 2310     Optus B3        CZ-2E           Xichang         Comsat      55A
Aug 28 0750     Kiku 6          H-II            Tanegashima     Comsat      56A
Aug 29 1738     DMSP 23545      Atlas 20E       Vandenberg      Weather     57A
Sep  9 0029     Telstar 402     Ariane 42L      Kourou ELA2     Comsat      58A
Sep  9 2222     Discovery       Space Shuttle   Kennedy LC39B   Spaceship   59A
Sep 13 2130     Spartan 201     -               Discovery, LEO  Astronomy   59B
Sep 16 1516     SAFER/M. Lee    -               Discovery, LEO
Sep 16 1740?    SAFER/C. Meade  -               Discovery, LEO
Sep 21 1753     Kosmos-2291     Proton-K/DM-2   Baykonur LC200  Comsat?     60A
Sep 27 1400     Kosmos-2292     Kosmos-3M       Plesetsk LC132  Calibration 61A

Reentries
---------


Sep 11          Kosmos-2284     Landed 
Sep 13          FSW-2 service module  Reentered
Sep 20          Discovery       Landed at Edwards AFB

Current Shuttle Processing Status
____________________________________________

Orbiters               Location   Mission    Launch Due
                                           
OV-102 Columbia        OPF Bay 1     OMDP    -
OV-103 Discovery       OPF Bay 2     STS-63  Feb   
OV-104 Atlantis        OPF Bay 3     STS-66  Oct 27
OV-105 Endeavour       LC39A         STS-68  Sep 30
                                          
ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks                       
                  
ML1/RSRM-40/ET-65/OV-105   LC39A     STS-68
ML2/RSRM-43                VAB Bay 1 STS-67
ML3/RSRM-42/ET-67          VAB Bay 3 STS-66   


.-------------------------------------------------------------------------.
|  Jonathan McDowell                 |  phone : (617) 495-7176            |
|  Harvard-Smithsonian Center for    |                                    |
|   Astrophysics                     |                                    |
|  60 Garden St, MS4                 |                                    |
|  Cambridge MA 02138                |  inter : jcm@urania.harvard.edu    |
|  USA                               |                                    |
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