Jonathan's Space Report No. 332 1997 Aug 29 Cambridge, MA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle and Mir --------------- Problems with Mir's primary and backup oxygen systems were quickly fixed on Aug 25. Power from Spektr and Kristall's solar panels has resumed, but they're having problems making the panels track the sun. The spacewalk by Solov'yov and Foale to search for the Spektr punctures will take place in early September. The STS-86 mission is being prepared for launch in September, and will dock with Mir. During a spacewalk, the MEEP exposure experiments will be retrieved from the outside of Mir's Docking Module. The payload bay of Atlantis contains: Bay 1: Tunnel adapter Bay 2-4: External Airlock and Orbiter Docking System Bay 5-7: Long Tunnel Bay 5S? : carriers for retrieved MEEP experiment Bay 8-9: Spacehab Double Module Bay 13S: GAS can The ODS will be used to dock to Mir; supplies will be brought up in the Spacehab module. Recent Launches --------------- NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) was launched on Aug 25. The Advanced Composition Explorer is the last Delta-class Explorer space science satellite, and will study the composition of cosmic rays and high energy particles in interplanetary space. ACE will be stationed at the Earth-Sun L1 libration point, 1.4 million km from Earth in the direction of the Sun. ACE was launched by a Boeing Delta 7920-8. The Delta second stage entered a 185 km parking orbit and then reignited to place itself and ACE in a 185 km x 1.4 million km elliptical orbit. At apogee, ACE will fire an onboard propulsion system to station itself at L1. The Delta rocket will probably be perturbed into solar orbit. This is the first time a Delta second stage has been placed in such a high orbit; previously escape missions have used the three stage version of the Delta. The Delta-class Explorers have been: ISEE 1 International Sun-Earth Explorer 1 1977 Oct 22-1987 Sep IUE International Ultraviolet Explorer 1978 Jan 26-1996 Sep ISEE 3 International Sun-Earth Explorer 3 (ICE) (aka International Cometary Explorer) 1978 Aug 12-1986 DE 1/2 Dynamics Explorer 1 and 2 1981 Aug 3-1991 Feb SME Solar Mesosphere Explorer 1981 Oct 6-1983 Jul AMPTE-CCE Charge Composition Explorer 1984 Aug 16-1989 Jan COBE Cosmic Background Explorer 1989 Nov 18-1997 May EUVE Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer 1992 Jun 7 RXTE Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer 1995 Dec 30 ACE Advanced Composition Explorer 1997 Aug 25 (Many earlier Explorer flights were also launched on Delta, but I count them in other subdivisions of the Explorer program, e.g. Atmosphere Explorer and Interplanetary Monitoring Platform). Another Panamsat comsat was launched on Aug 28 aboard an International Launch Services/Krunichev Proton-K from Baykonur. An Energiya Blok DM-3 upper stage was used to deliver it to a standard geostationary transfer orbit of 214 x 36018 km x 51.6 deg. (Actually the Proton usually uses a slightly lower 46 degree transfer orbit inclination). The PAS 5 satellite is a Hughes HS-601HP design, and is using a Marquardt R-4D-12 liquid apogee engine to raise its orbit to geostationary. Orbital's Pegasus XL made another successful flight on Aug 29. This time it launched the FORTE satellite for Los Alamos National Lab. FORTE will study natural and artificial radio emissions from the ionosphere, as part of a program to develop technology for monitoring nuclear test ban treaties. Early reports are that FORTE is operating successfully in an 800 x 807 km x 70.0 deg orbit. FORTE stands for Fast On-orbit Recording of Transient Events; it was built at Los Alamos. The Lewis satellite's attitude control system malfunctioned on Aug 26, leading to battery discharge and probable loss of the satellite, although attempts to revive it are continuing. Last issue I mentioned Olin Aerospace as proving propulsion for the LMLV's Orbit Adjust Module. This company is now Primex Aerospace. NASA's Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF) is scheduled for launch one year from now. The spacecraft, being built by TRW, will carry imaging and spectroscopic X-ray detectors and be launched into a highly elliptical orbit by Shuttle/IUS on 1998 Aug 27. The AXAF operations control center will be in Cambridge, Massachusetts, together with the AXAF Science Center (a joint venture led by the SAO and MIT X-ray groups, who also developed the instruments together with Penn State, Utrecht and MPE). As the launch date approaches, don't be surprised if this newsletter gets a little sporadic :-) Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Jul 1 1802 Columbia ) Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 32A Spacelab MSL-1R ) Jul 5 0411 Progress M-35 Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Cargo 33A Jul 6 0600 Sojourner - Sagan Station, Mars Rover Jul 9 1304 Iridium SV015 ) Delta 7920 Vandenberg SLC2W Comsat 34A Iridium SV017 ) Comsat 34B Iridium SV018 ) Comsat 34C Iridium SV020 ) Comsat 34D Iridium SV021 ) Comsat 34E Jul 23 0343 GPS SVN 43 Delta 7925 Canaveral LC17A Navsat 35A Jul 28 0115 Superbird C Atlas IIAS Canaveral LC36B Comsat 36A Aug 1 2020 OrbView 2 Pegasus XL Vandenberg Remote sen.37A Aug 5 1536 Soyuz TM-26 Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Spaceship 38A Aug 7 1441 Discovery Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 39A Aug 7 2227 CRISTA-SPAS OV-103,LEO Remote sen.39B Aug 8 0646 PAS 6 Ariane 4 Kourou ELA2 Comsat 40A Aug 14 2049 Kosmos-2345 Proton-K/DM2 Baykonur Early Warn 41A Aug 19 1750 Agila 2 CZ-3B Xichang LC2 Comsat 42A Aug 21 0038 Iridium 22) Delta 7920 Vandenberg SLC2W Comsat 43E Iridium 23) Comsat 43D Iridium 24) Comsat 43C Iridium 25) Comsat 43B Iridium 26) Comsat 43A Aug 23 0651 Lewis LMLV-1 Vandenberg SLC6 Remote sen. 44A Aug 25 1439 ACE Delta 7920 Canaveral LC17A Space sci. 45A Aug 28 0033 PAS 5 Proton-K/DM3 Baykonur Comsat 46A Aug 29 1502 FORTE Pegasus XL Vandenberg Space sci. 47A Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 2 STS-87 Nov 19 OV-103 Discovery OPF Bay 3 STS-91 May 28 OV-104 Atlantis LC39A STS-86 Sep 22 OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 1 STS-89 Jan 15 MLP/SRB/ET/OV stacks MLP1/ MLP2/RSRM-61/ET/OV-104 LC39A STS-86 MLP3/ .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | 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.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'