Jonathan's Space Report No. 312 1997 Feb 5 Cambridge, MA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle and Mir --------------- Progress M-33 will undock from Mir's Kvant module +X port on Feb 6, and Soyuz TM-24 will undock from the Mir -X port on Feb 7, redocking at the Kvant +X port shortly afterwards (info from Vladimir Agapov). Launch of RKK Energiya's 7K-STM spacecraft No. 74 is scheduled for Feb 10. This spacecraft will be named Soyuz TM-25 once reaching orbit, and will carry the Russian EO-23 and German DLR Mir-97 crews to Mir. EO-23 commander is Vasiliy Vasilevich Tsibliev, and flight engineer is Aleksandr Ivanovich Lazutkin. Mir-97 astronaut-researcher is Reinhold Ewald. Currently on board the Mir station are EO-22 crew Valeriy Korzun and Aleksandr Kaleri, and NASA-4 crewmember Jerry Linenger. After the return of Soyuz TM-24 to Earth at the beginning of March, the crew will be Tsibliev, Lazutkin and Linenger. Launch of Soyuz TM-25 will be carried out by an 11A511U (Soyuz-U) launch vehicle from the Baykonur spaceport (GIK-5) in Kazakstan. Tsibliev was selected for the Russian Air Force astronaut detachment in 1987 and first flew on Soyuz TM-17. Lazutkin joined NPO Energiya's civilian astronaut team in 1991 and has not flown before. Ewald was selected for the German astronaut team in 1990. and was backup for the Soyuz TM-14 mission in 1992. Soyuz TM-25 will dock at Mir's -X port on Feb 12. Soyuz TM-24 will undock from Kvant +X in March and land in Kazakstan; Progress M-33 will remain in orbit probably until March and then be deorbited over the Pacific. Launch of Shuttle mission STS-82 is scheduled for Feb 11. OV-103 Discovery wil be launched from pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center and will rendezvous with and capture the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Discovery's payload bay contains: RMS: Remote Manipulator System No. 301 Bay 1: Airlock Tunnel Adapter Bay 2: Orbiter Docking System Bay 4-5: SAC Second Axial Carrier Bay 6 Keel: Camera Bay 7-8: ORUC Orbital Replacement Unit Carrier Bay 10 Port: APC (Adaptive Payload Carrier) with MFR, Manipulator Foot Restraint Bay 11: FSS Flight Support System Bay 13 Port: APC with PFR, Portable Foot Restraint The Orbiter Docking System was added to Discovery after its last refit, so that the Orbiter can support Mir and Space Station missions. Astronauts will exit through the ODS airlock into the payload bay. A Tool Stowage Assembly (TSA) is mounted on the outside of the ODS, containing tools for the spacewalkers to use. The SAC is the same device formerly called Solar Array Carrier which flew on mission STS-61. On this mission it carries gyros and other replacement components for HST, as well as the NICMOS science instrument. The ORUC is a Spacelab Pallet and carries the STIS science instrument and a replacement FGS 1 (Fine Guidance Sensor 1). The Flight Support System is a docking ring for HST; Discovery will capture HST with its manipulator arm and lower it onto the FSS. FSS first flew on the Solar Max Repair Mission in 1984. STIS, the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, will replace both GHRS (the Goddard High Res Spectrograph) and FOS (the Faint Object Spectrograph). The big difference is that STIS has two-dimensional detectors, giving you one axis of wavelength (spectrum) and another axis of position. This means that you can get a background spectrum at the same time as your source spectrum, so you can study faint objects more easily, and you can study how a spectrum changes across a spatially extended object like a galaxy. STIS has three detectors, two ultraviolet-sensitive microchannel plate arrays and one optical CCD camera. NICMOS, the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer, marks HST's entry into infrared astronomy. The HST mirror has always been able to collect near infrared light, it just didn't have any cameras which could register those photons. NICMOS covers the 0.8 to 2.5 micron spectral range; parts of this range are covered by the I, J, H and K atmospheric windows in the optical but you need to go into space to get an uninterrupted view of this crucial chunk of spectrum. Crew of STS-82 are Ken Bowersox (Commander), Scott Horowitz (Pilot), Mark Lee (Payload Commander )and Mission Specialists Joe Tanner, Steve Hawley, Greg Harbaugh, and Steve Smith. The first EVA will be carried out by Lee and Smith. They will replace the GHRS spectrograph with STIS, and then replace FOS with NICMOS. EVA 2, by Harbaugh and Tanner, will involve replacing FGS 1 and adding new electronics. EVA 3, by Lee and Smith, will replace a Data Interface Unit (DIU-2), a data recorder, and a reaction wheel assembly (RWA-1). Harbaugh and Tanner, on EVA 4, will replace the solar array drive electronics (SADE-2) and magnetometer (MSS) covers. After the spacewalks are complete, Discovery will boost HST's orbit and then release it. The existing imaging instruments (WFPC-2 and FOC) are not affected by the servicing mission (we hope!) and will resume observations withing a few weeks; the new instruments will take several months to go into regular service. Steve Hawley (1978 group )was former chief Scientist Astronaut, and flew on the original STS-31R HST deployment mission. He had left the astronaut corps, but returned specially for this STS-82 mission. Bowersox was part of the 1987 group of astronauts, and was pilot on the first HST repair mission. This is his fourth flight and his second command. Greg Harbaugh (1987 group) flew on the first Mir docking mission and made a training EVA on mission STS-54. Mark Lee (1984 group) test flew the SAFER backpack on STS-64; the other two spacewalkers are new to the experience; Smith and Tanner were in the 1992 astronaut group, as is pilot Horowitz. Recent Launches --------------- Ariane flight V93 was successfully launched from the Centre Spatiale Guyanais on Jan 30. The third stage of the launch vehicle entered geostationary transfer orbit, releasing two communications satellites. GE 2 is the second Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space A2100 series comsat and is owned by GE Americom. It has 24 C-band and 24 Ku-band transponders and will provide communications services in North America. Nahuel 1A is a Dornier/Aerospatiale Spacebus 2000 class comsat for the Argentine NAHUELSAT communications company, providing direct TV services to all of Latin America with 18 Ku-band transponders. The two satellites both carry liquid apogee engines which will be used to raise their orbits to geosynchronous altitude over the next few weeks. V93 placed the payloads in a 637.0 min, 241 x 36049 km x 7.5 deg orbit. By Feb 1 GE 2 had raised perigee to 3814 x 35818 km x 4.6 deg, and Nahuel was at 13893 x 35879 km x 1.9 deg. On Feb 5, Nahuel was in a 35491 x 35899 km x 0.1 deg orbit over 73.6W, drifting 1 deg per day. GE 2 was in a 35741 x 35824 km x 0.1 deg orbit over 82.4W according to Space Command, but those orbital elements may be a search orbit rather than an actual observation. I'm not sure if the GPS IIR payload lost on Jan 17 was production vehicle Number 2 (SVN 42) or Number 3 (SVN 43); if anyone knows, please email me. Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Dec 4 0658 Mars Pathfinder Delta 7925 Canaveral LC17B Mars probe 68A Dec 11 1200 Kosmos-2335 Tsiklon-2 Baykonur LC90 Recon 69A Dec 18 0157 Inmarsat III F3 Atlas IIA Canaveral LC36 Comsat 70A Dec 20 0644 Kosmos-2336 Kosmos-3M Plesetsk LC132 Navsat 71A Dec 20 1804 USA 129 Titan 4 Vandenberg SLC4E Recon 72A Dec 24 1350 Bion No. 11 Soyuz-U Plesetsk LC43 Life sci 73A Jan 12 0928 Atlantis Shuttle Kennedy LC39B Spaceship 01A Jan 17 1628 GPS IIR No. 2? Delta 7925 Canaveral LC17A Navsat FTO Jan 30 2204 GE 2 ) Ariane 44L Kourou ELA2 Comsat 02A Nahuel 1A) Comsat 02B Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 1 STS-83 Apr 19 OV-103 Discovery LC39A STS-82 Feb 11 OV-104 Atlantis OPF Bay 3 STS-84 May 15 OV-105 Endeavour Palmdale OMDP ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/RSRM-58/ET-81/OV-103 LC39A STS-82 ML2/ ML3/RSRM-59/ET-84 VAB Bay 1 STS-83 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | 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 | | Back issues: ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'