Jonathan's Space Report No. 261 1995 Oct 23 Tucson, AZ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle ------- Columbia was launched at 1353 UTC on Oct 20 on the STS-73 mission. RSRM-50 SRB separation came at 1355:04, with main engine cutoff around 1401:30 and external tank ET-73 separating shortly afterwards. This left orbiter 102 in an elliptical transfer orbit, with firing of the OMS engines due around 1435 UTC. The OMS-2 burn was successful and left Columbia in a 90.0 min, 267 x 278 km x 39.0 deg orbit. The US Microgravity Lab 2 mission uses a Spacelab laboratory module in the cargo bay and an Extended Duration Orbiter pallet in the rear of the bay. Columbia is scheduled to land on Nov 5 after a flight lasting 15 days 22 hours. Mir ---- Astronauts Thomas Reiter and Sergey Avdeev carried out a 5h 11m spacewalk on Oct 20 from 1155 to 1706 UTC (hatch open to hatch close). They used the airlock on the Kvant-2 module. Reiter was transferred to the end of the Spektr module using the Strela crane and installed experiments on the Spektr science platform. Recent Launches -------------- An Ariane 42L was successfully launched into geostationary transfer orbit on Oct 19. It delivered to orbit the Astra 1E satellite, a Hughes HS-601 comsat which will provide television broadcasting services for the Luxembourg-registered company SES (Societe Europeene des Satellites). On Oct 19 Astra 1E was in a 504 x 35845 km x 4.2 deg transfer orbit with a period of 638.13 min. The US Navy UHF F6 communications satellite, also an HS-601 model, was launched on Oct 22 by a Lockheed Martin Atlas II from Cape Canaveral. On Oct 18 Luch-1 was drifting at 1.3deg W per day over 82.1 deg E. Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Sep 3 0900 Soyuz TM-22 Soyuz-U2 Baykonur LC1 Spaceship 47A Sep 7 1509 Endeavour Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 48A Sep 8 1543 Spartan-201 OV-105, LEO Astronomy 48B Sep 11 1125 WSF 2 OV-105, LEO Micrograv. 48C Sep 24 0006 Telstar 402R Ariane 4 Kourou ELA2 Comsat 49A Sep 26 1120 Resurs-F Soyuz-U Plesetsk LC43-4 Rem.sensing 50A Sep 29 0425 Kosmos-2320 Soyuz-U Baykonur LC31 Recon 51A Oct 6 0323 Kosmos-2321 Kosmos-3M Plesetsk LC132 Navsat 52A Oct 8 1851 Progress M-29 Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Cargo 53A Oct 11 1626 Luch-1 Proton-K/DM2M Baykonur Data Relay 54A Oct 19 0038 Astra 1E Ariane 42L Kourou ELA2 Comsat 55A Oct 20 1353 Columbia ) Shuttle Kennedy LC39B Spaceship 56A Spacelab USML-2) Oct 22 0800 UHF F6 Atlas II Canaveral LC36 Comsat Reentries --------- Sep 4 Progress M-28 Deorbited Sep 6 Kosmos-2314 Deorbited Sep 11 Soyuz TM-21 Landed in Kazakhstan Sep 18 Endeavour Landed at KSC Sep 29 ODERACS IIB Reentered Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia LEO STS-73 Oct 20 OV-103 Discovery Palmdale OMDP OV-104 Atlantis LC39A STS-74 Nov OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 3 STS-72 Jan 11 ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/ ML2/RSRM-51/ET-74/OV-104 LC39A STS-74 ML3/ LC39B STS-73 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS6 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : jcm@urania.harvard.edu | | USA | jmcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | | | JSR: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/QEDT/jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html | | ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'