Jonathan's Space Report No. 133 1992 Nov 18 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Discovery is on Pad 39A awating launch on mission STS-53. This mission will deploy a classified reconnaissance satellite for the National Reconnaissance Office and a group of small radar calibration satellites called ODERACS. The mission will be commanded by David Walker. Pilot is Robert Cabana and mission specialists are Guion Bluford, Jim Voss and Mike Clifford. An Ekran direct broadcasting satellite was launched by Proton from Baykonur on Oct 30. This is the first Ekran launch since 1988; an improved version had been expected to replace the system. By Nov 5 the Ekran satellite was at 98.6 degrees E approaching its operational 99 E station. As predicted, the publicity mission by a group of Russian companies using a Resurs-F satellite was launched on Nov 15. The Vostok class spacecraft, Resurs-500, is to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Columbus and to drum up US investment in Russian trade. Orbit is 181 x 242 km x 82.6 degrees. The descent craft is scheduled to land in the ocean off Seattle, Washington. The first successful Zenit launch in over two and a half years occurred from Baykonur on Nov 17, after three failures in a row. It placed a Russian military signals intelligence satellite in an 850 km orbit inclined 71 degrees. The Zenit launch vehicle is built by NPO Yuzhnoye in the Ukraine. The Canadian CTA target satellite deployed from STS-52 reentered on Nov 1. A defunct signals intelligence satellite, Kosmos-756, reentered on Nov 5 after 17 years in space. As usual around now, the launch rate is way down. For some reason November is almost always a very quiet time for launches. Launches: Date Payload Rocket From Oct 30 1340? Ekran Proton Baykonur 74A Oct 31 1006 CTA - OV-102 Columbia, LEO 70C Nov 15 2150? Resurs-500 Soyuz Plesetsk 75A Nov 17 0750? Kosmos-2219 Zenit Baykonur 76A Reentries: Date Nov 1 1406 Columbia Nov 1 CTA Nov 5 Kosmos-756 Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 2 STS-55 OV-103 Discovery LC39A STS-53 OV-104 Atlantis Palmdale OMDP OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 1 STS-54 ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/STS-53/ET/OV-103 LC39A ML2/STS-54/ET VAB Bay 1 ML3/STS-55 VAB Bay 3 .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS4 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | USA | | '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------'