Jonathan's Space Report No. 628 2010 May 26 Somerville, MA ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle and Station -------------------- On the station, Soyuz TMA-17 switched parking spots, and Atlantis made its final visit to add the Rassvet module and replace some batteries. Astronauts Kotov, Creamer and Noguchi flew Soyuz TMA-17 from Zarya to Zvezda on May 12. They undocked from the Zarya nadir port at 1326 UTC, retreated to a distance of 50m by 1335 UTC, flew around to 50m from Zvezda by 1341 UTC. After stationkeeping for a few minutes they began final approach at 1348 UTC and docked with the aft Zvezda port at 1353 UTC. This left the Zarya port ready to receive the Rassvet module when it was delivered by Atlantis. Atlantis took off from Kennedy Space Center on May 14 at 1820 UTC. The SRBs separated two minutes after launch. Main engine cutoff and external tank separation followed at 1828 UTC, with Atlantis and the ET in a 58 x 219 km x 51.6 deg orbit. The OMS-2 burn at 1858 UTC raised the orbit of Atlantis to 157 x 228 km, and over the next two days the Shuttle raised its orbit to match the 340 x 353 km path of ISS. Atlantis docked with the PMA-2 port on the station at 1428 UTC on May 16. The Station robot arm took the ICC-VLD carrier from the payload bay and stowed it on the transporter base overnight. On May 17 at 1151 UTC the Quest airlock was depressurized past 50 mbar at the beginning of the first spacewalk by Garrett Reisman and Steve Bowen, during which the astronauts installed a new SGANT (Space-to-Ground Antenna) on the Z1 truss and the EOTP equipment platform on the Dextre robot. On May 18 at 1220 UTC the Rassvet module was connected to the nadir port on Zarya. On May 19 EVA-2 with Bowen and Good from 1036 UTC to 1747 UTC and on May 21 EVA-3 with Good and Reisman from 1024 to 1713 UTC saw the successful replacement of six batteries on the P6 truss. The station truss has 48 replaceable 170-kg battery packs, 12 on each of the S4, P4, S6 and P6 truss segments. P6 was launched seven years earlier than the other segments and its batteries are aging, so six of them were replaced on mission STS-127 last year and the other six were swapped out this time. The Station arm put the ICC-VLD back in the Shuttle's payload bay at 0950 UTC on May 22. Atlantis undocked at 1522 UTC on May 23 and landed on runway 33 at Kennedy Space Center at 1248 UTC on May 26, completing mission STS-132, which was (at least according to the current plan) its final flight in space. In the Vehicle Assembly Building, solid rocket motors RSRM-112 are being stacked on the launch platform while external tank ET-137 is being prepared nearby, and next door, in Orbiter Processing Facility 3 (OPF 3), OV-103 Discovery is being kitted out for mission STS-133 which will probably fly late this year. The final Shuttle mission, STS-134, will use orbiter OV-105 Endeavour, now in OPF 2. Its launch will probably slip to early in 2011. X-37B ----- One month after it was launched, hobbyist observers Kevin Fetter and Greg Roberts have located the secret X-37B spaceplane in a 399 x 419 km x 40.0 deg orbit. Akatsuki -------- Japan's PLANET-C (`puranetto-c') Venus probe, Akatsuki, was launched from Tanegashima on May 20 at 2158 UTC. Akatsuki is Japanese for 'Dawn' or 'Daybreak' - just like the Russian 'Rassvet', a popular spacecraft name this week it seems. Launch was by H-IIA 202 rocket, flight F17. F17 reached a 292 x 306 km x 30.0 deg low Earth orbit at 2210 UTC and deployed three cubesats: KSAT for Kagoshima University, Negai* ("Negai-star" but always written with a star symbol) for Soka University in Tokyo, and Waseda-Sat 2 for Waseda University in Tokyo. KSAT carries an experiment to study atmospheric water vapor. The three cubesats have been cataloged in 290 x 305 km x 30.0 deg orbits. F17's second stage restarted at 2220 UTC to accelerate to escape velocity. It cutoff at 2224 UTC, and then deployed three spacecraft into a 0.72 x 1.07 AU x 2.0 deg solar orbit: Akatsuki, Unitec-1 and Ikaros. Unitec-1 will space-qualify university-built spacecraft computers; Ikaros will test a solar sail; and Akatsuki will become a Venus-orbiting weather satellite with visible, infrared and ultraviolet cameras. The PAF900M adapter separating Akatsuki and Ikaros was jettisoned into solar orbit. Ariane V194 ----------- Arianespace launched Ariane 5ECA vehicle L551 on May 21. Flight number V194 placed the Astra 3B and ComsatBw-2 communications satellites. in transfer orbit. The L551 core stage reached a -971 x 173 km x 6.5 deg suborbital path and the ESC-A stage put the satellites in a 263 x 35764 km x 3.0 deg transfer orbit. Astra 3B is an Astrium Eurostar 3000 satellite with Ku- and Ka-band transponders and supplements SES Astra's service at 23E. Launch mass is 5471 kg; dry mass is probably around 3000 kg. The smaller COMSATBw-2 (launch mass 2440 kg, dry 1040 kg) is a TAS-F Spacebus 3000B2 satellite with SHF, UHF and Ku-band communications systems for the Bundeswehr (German armed forces). Artemis ------- I have been remiss in not keeping up to date with the Artemis lunar mission. Two of NASA's five Earth orbiting THEMIS spacecraft, THEMIS B and C, were coopted for ARTEMIS following the end of their primary magnetospheric research missions. Their onboard propulsion systems were used to raise their orbits starting last July, and they are now both operating beyond the orbit of the Moon. THEMIS B made lunar flybys on Jan 31 and Feb 13, and THEMIS C made a lunar flyby on Mar 28. The THEMIS and ARTEMIS missions are led by a team at University of California-Berkeley. The spacecraft will study the solar wind, the distant magnetotail, and the lunar wake, and will end up in lunar orbit. Here is data based mostly on the GSFC SSC Locator orbit tool; it differs somewhat from the information on the ARTEMIS team's web pages at Berkeley. THEMIS B (ARTEMIS P1): 2007-004B Time UTC 2009 Sep 10 2870 x 284665 km x 10.0 deg orbit 2009 Sep 13 2870 x 347000 km translunar injection 2009 Sep 17 0049 Lunar flyby height 43875 km 2009 Sep 26 19690 x 347310 km x 8.8 deg orbit 2009 Dec 2 32851 x 356728 km x 10.6 deg orbit 2009 Dec 8 0125 Lunar flyby height 16101 km 2009 Dec 25 48908 x 354833 km 2010 Jan 31 0813 Lunar flyby height 11992 km 2010 Feb 13 1006 Lunar flyby height 2958 km 2010 Mar 15 Apogee at 1189181 km 2010 Apr 13 2120 Perigee at 10644 km 2010 May 22 At 1438600 km en route to Earth-Moon L2 THEMIS C (ARTEMIS P2): 2007-004C Time UTC 2009 Sep 6 3505 x 159642 km x 8.1 deg orbit 2010 Feb 1 1444 Distant lunar pass at 69222 km 2010 Feb 25 7065 x 287087 km x 3.9 deg orbit 2010 Feb 26 7268 x 325166 km translunar injection 2010 Mar 1 0411 Distant lunar pass at 68036 km 2010 Mar 7 18644 x 326528 km 2010 Mar 28 0734 Lunar flyby height 9366 km? (10200 km per UCB) 2010 Apr 20 Apogee at 948560 km 2010 May 12 Perigee at 89178 km 2010 May 22 At 734400 km en route to 1200000 km apogee Suborbital flights ------------------ Taiwan launched a suborbital ionospheric payload on May 5; India tested the Agni missile on May 17. Another MARTI target for the Airborne Laser project was launched on a NASA Black Brant from San Nicholas Island off the California coast on May 3. NASA 36.270UG was launched from White Sands on May 21 carrying the University of Colorado's Diffuse Interstellar Cloud Experiment (DICE), which uses a far-ultraviolet spectrograph to detect absorption along the line of sight to two stars. Table of Recent (orbital) Launches ---------------------------------- Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Apr 2 0404 Soyuz TMA-18 Soyuz-FG Baykonur LC1 Spaceship 11A Apr 5 1021 Discovery (STS-131) Space Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 12A Leonardo Module 12 Apr 8 1357 CryoSat-2 Dnepr Baykonur LC109/95 Science 13A Apr 15 1057 GSAT-4 GSLV Mk II Sriharikota Comms F01 Apr 16 1500 Kosmos-2462 Soyuz-U Plesetsk Imaging 14A Apr 22 2352 X-37B OTV-1 Atlas V 501 Canaveral SLC41 Spaceplane 15A Apr 24 1119 SES-1 Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur Comms 16A Apr 27 0105 Kosmos-2463 Kosmos-3M Plesetsk LC132/1 Nav 17A Apr 28 1715 Progress M-05M Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Cargo 18A May 14 1820 Atlantis (STS-132) Space Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 19A May 20 2158 Akatsuki ) H-IIA 202 Tanegashima Venus Probe 20D Ikaros ) Solar sail 20E Unitec-1 ) Tech 20F Negai* ) Tech/imaging 20A Waseda-Sat 2) Imaging 20B KSAT ) Science 20C May 21 2201 Astra 3B ) Ariane 5ECA Kourou ELA3 Comms 21A ComsatBw-2) Comms 21B Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches ---------------------------------- Date UT Payload/Flt Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission Apogee/km Apr 23 2300 HTV-2a Minotaur IVL Vandenberg SLC8 Hypersonic 100? May 3 0947 NASA 36.248DR Black Brant IX San Nicholas I Target 150? May 3 1832 NASA 36.258UE Black Brant IX White Sands Solar EUV 280? May 4 1241 SpaceLoft SL-4 SpaceLoft XL SW Regional Micrograv 113? May 5 1150 SR VII Sounding Rocket Jiu Peng Ionosphere 287 May 17 0348 Agni RV Agni A2 Wheeler I Training 300? May 21 0900? NASA 36.270UG Black Brant IX White Sands UV Astron 325? .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Somerville MA 02143 | inter : jcm@host.planet4589.org | | USA | jcm@cfa.harvard.edu | | | | JSR: http://www.planet4589.org/jsr.html | | Back issues: http://www.planet4589.org/space/jsr/back | | Subscribe/unsub: mail majordomo@host.planet4589.org, (un)subscribe jsr | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'