Jonathan's Space Report No. 344 1997 Dec 21 Cambridge, MA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle and Mir --------------- The last Shuttle mission of the year, STS-87, has been completed. Columbia landed on Dec 5, with a deorbit burn at 1121 UTC, returning to Earth the Spartan satellite and the USMP-4 microgravity science payload. Touchdown was at 1220 UTC on KSC's runway 33. Launch of STS-89 has been delayed a few days to Jan 22; Endeavour was rolled out to pad 39A on Dec 19. STS-89 will dock with the Mir station. Progress M-36 undocked from Mir on Dec 17 at 0602 UTC and flew out to a range of 700m. The Inspector satellite was deployed at 0735 to take pictures of Mir, but its navigation system failed and it drifted away from the station. X-Mir Inspector was built by Daimler-Benz Aerospace/Bremen, Germany. Progress M-36 was deorbited at 1620 UTC on Dec 19. Progress M-37 was launched from Baykonur the following day, and will bring new supplies to the Mir station. Erratum ------- The Cyclade adapter system, Stefan Barensky tells me, was also used on the first Ariane 4 launch in 1988. Recent Launches --------------- Two Iridium satellites were launched on Dec 8 from Taiyuan in China. Iridium 42 and 44 were launched by a Chang Zheng 2C-3-SD rocket with a 'Smart Dispenser' upper stage. This rocket was test flown with two dummy satellites earlier in the year. Five more Iridium satellites, built by Motorola and Lockheed, were launched on a Boeing Delta 2 from Vandenberg on Dec 20; I don't have their serial numbers yet. The Galaxy 8I comsat was launched from Cape Canaveral by Lockheed Martin's AC-149 Atlas 2AS. The Centaur stage entered a supersynchronous transfer orbit of 280 x 50607 km with inclination of 26.8 deg. Galaxy 8I is a Hughes HS-601HP satellite owned by Panamsat and will be used by Galaxy Latin America broadcasting. Kosmos-2347 was launched on Dec 9 by Tsiklon-2 from 5-GIK Baykonur. (SPACEWARN initially called this satellite Kosmos-2348 in error). The satellite, developed by KB Arsenal, is a US-P class naval electronic intelligence satellite and was launched into a 110 x 400 km transfer orbit by the two-stage 11K69 Tsiklon-2 (built by the Ukranian Yuzhnoe enterprise with Russian engines). Its own engine then fired to circularize at 401 x 419 km x 65.0 deg. Kosmos-2348 was launched Dec 15 by Soyuz-U from Plesetsk. It is a Yantar'-class reconnaissance satellite (probably a Kobalt class vehicle) in a 165 x 343 km x 67.1 deg orbit. The Kobalt satellites are believed to be similar to the earlier Oktan (Yantar'-4K1) satellites, which carried a Zhemchug camera system in a large recoverable OSA (Special Apparatus Module) reentry vehicle, attached during the mission to a service module with solar panels and a maneuvring engine. The Oktan satellites also carried two small SpK film return capsules which were recovered while the mission was still in progress. The Yantar' series are built by the TsSKB-Progress enterprise in Samara, Russia. JCSAT-5 is now in geosynchronous orbit. Jun Takei from JCSAT reports that the five liquid apogee motor burns were carried out from Dec 4 to Dec 8, and the solar panels and antenna have been deployed. Av Week now has changed its mind and says that the TRUMPET satellite was a Boeing/Kent Valley product, in agreement with my sources. Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Nov 2 1225 SCD-2A VLS Alcantara Rem.sens. FTO Nov 3 0405 Sputnik-40 Mir,LEO Demo 58C Nov 6 0030 GPS 38 Delta 7925 Canaveral LC17A Navsat 67A Nov 8 0205 TRUMPET 3? Titan Centaur Canaveral LC41 Signal int 68A Nov 9 0134 Iridium 38 ) Delta 7920 Vandenberg SLC2W Comsat 69E Iridium 39 ) Comsat 69D Iridium 40 ) Comsat 69C Iridium 41 ) Comsat 69B Iridium 43 ) Comsat 69A Nov 12 1700 Kupon Proton Baykonur LC200 Comsat 70A Nov 12 2148 Sirius 2 ) Ariane 44L Kourou ELA2 Comsat 71A Cakrawarta 1 ) Comsat 71B Nov 18 1115 Resurs-F1M Soyuz-U Plesetk Rem.sens. 72A Nov 19 1946 Columbia Shuttle Kennedy LC39B Spaceship 73A Nov 21 2105 Spartan 201 OV-102, LEO Astronomy 73B Nov 27 2127 TRMM ) H-2 Tanegashima Rem.sens. 74A Hikoboshi ) Technology 74B Orihime ) Dec 2 2252 JCSAT-5 ) Ariane 44P Kourou ELA2 Comsat 75A Equator-S ) Space sci 75B Dec 2 2310 Astra 1G Proton Baykonur Comsat 76A Dec 3 1215 AERCam/Sprint OV-102, LEO Technology Dec 8 0716 Iridium 42 ) CZ-2C/SD Taiyuan Comsat 77A Iridium 44 ) Comsat 77B Dec 8 2352 Galaxy 8I Atlas 2AS Canaveral LC36B Comsat 78A Dec 9 0717 Kosmos-2347 Tsiklon-2 Baykonur LC90 Recon 79A Dec 15 1540? Kosmos-2348 Soyuz-U Plesetsk Recon 80A Dec 17 0737 X-Mir Inspector Progress,LEO Technology 58D Dec 20 0845 Progress M-37 Soyuz-U Baykonur Cargo 81A Dec 20 1316 Iridium ) Delta 7920 Vandenberg SLC2 Comsat 82 Iridium ) Comsat 82 Iridium ) Comsat 82 Iridium ) Comsat 82 Iridium ) Comsat 82 Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia LEO STS-87 OV-103 Discovery OPF Bay 2 STS-91 May 28 OV-104 Atlantis Palmdale OMDP OV-105 Endeavour LC39A STS-89 Jan 22 MLP/SRB/ET/OV stacks MLP1/ MLP2/RSRM65 VAB Bay 3 STS-90 MLP3/RSRM64/ET-90/OV-105 LC39A STS-89 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | 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/~jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html | | Back issues: ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'