Jonathan's Space Report No. 412 1999 Nov 28 Cambridge, MA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Recent Launches --------------- China launched its Shenzhou spaceship on Nov 19 on a test flight without astronauts aboard. Further test flights are expected before its first piloted flight. Shenzhou ("Divine Ship") was launched by the new CZ-2F vehicle, an improved version of the CZ-2E, from a new pad at China's oldest space launch site, Jiuquan in the Gobi desert. Shenzhou's reentry vehicle was recovered after a 21 hour flight at 1941 UTC on Nov 20 in Inner Mongolia. Shenzhou's orbit was 197 x 323 km x 42.6 deg. Two debris objects were tracked after the launch, possibly launch adapters or fairings. The spacecraft's design is analogous to the 7K Soyuz, with a propulsion module, a descent module and an orbital module. The descent module appears to be identical to the Soyuz-TM descent module and reports indicate that actual Soyuz flight hardware purchased from Russia may have been used, albeit with Chinese developed avionics. The remainder of the spacecraft is a fully Chinese design. Details of the propulsion module are not available. The orbital module is cylindrical and somewhat similar in shape and appearance to the US Unity Node on the Space Station. During Nov 21 the orbital module separated, and then at around 1850 UTC the propulsion module fired its engine for the deorbit burn, separating from the descent module and burning up in the atmosphere. The orbital module was left in a 205 x 332 km orbit. Starsem launched a Soyuz-U/Ikar from Baykonur on Nov 22 with four more Globalstar satellites. This was the first launch from Baykonur since the recent Proton failure. The Loral Globalstar satellites were deployed in the usual 900 x 942 km x 52.0 deg parking orbit. The Ikar stage ignited again to deorbit itself on Nov 23. The Blok I third stage is in a 230 x 876 km x 52.0 deg orbit. Lockheed Martin/International Launch Services launched a Lockheed Martin Astronautics Atlas 2A, serial AC-136, from Cape Canaveral on Nov 23. The Centaur entered low circular parking orbit on its first burn, and then reignited to place the UHF F/O F10 satellite in subsynchronous transfer orbit. On Nov 28 the satellite was in a 26527 x 36665 km x 7.2 deg orbit after the first burns of its R-4D liquid apogee engine. UHF Followon F10 is a Hughes HS-601 satellite with UHF and EHF communications payloads and the Global Broadcast Service TV payload, and will provide communications services for the US Navy. Galileo made a 300 km flyby of Io on Nov 26 at 0400 UTC. Galileo is probably now in a 407000 x 6200000 km x 1.3 deg orbit around Jupiter, although the orbital element data on the Galileo web site has not been updated for the post-Europa-mission phase. Table of Recent Launches ----------------------- Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Oct 7 1251 Navstar SVN 46 Delta 7925 Canaveral SLC17A Navsat 55A Oct 10 0328 DirecTV 1R Zenit-3SL Odyssey, POR Comsat 56A Oct 14 0315 Zi Yuan 1 ) Chang Zheng 4B Taiyuan Imaging 57A SACI 1 ) Science 57B Oct 18 1322 Globalstar 31) Soyuz-Ikar Baykonur LC1 Comsat 58A Globalstar 56) Comsat 58B Globalstar 57) Comsat 58C Globalstar 59) Comsat 58D Oct 19 0622 Orion 2 Ariane 44LP Kourou ELA2 Comsat 59A Oct 27 1616 Ekspress-A1 Proton-K Baykonur Comsat F03 Nov 13 2255 GE 4 Ariane 44LP Kourou ELA2 Comsat 60A Nov 15 0729 MTSAT H-2 Tanegashima Comsat F04 Nov 19 2230 Shenzhou Chang Zheng 2F Jiuquan Spaceship 61A Nov 22 1620 Globalstar 29 ) Soyuz-Ikar Baykonur LC1 Comsat 62A Globalstar 34 ) Comsat 62B Globalstar 39 ) Comsat 62C Globalstar 61 ) Comsat 62D Nov 23 0406 UHF F/O F10 Atlas 2A Canaveral SLC36B Comsat 63A Current Shuttle Processing Status _________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia Palmdale OMDP OV-103 Discovery LC39B STS-103 1999 Dec 9 OV-104 Atlantis OPF Bay 3 STS-101 2000 Mar 16 OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 2 STS-99 2000 Jan 13 MLP1/ MLP2/RSRM-73/ET-101/OV-103 LC39B MLP3/RSRM-71?/ET? VAB Bay 3 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS6 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : jcm@cfa.harvard.edu | | USA | jmcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | | | JSR: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html | | Back issues: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/jsr/back | | Subscribe/unsub: mail majordomo@head-cfa.harvard.edu, (un)subscribe jsr | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'