Jonathan's Space Report No. 272 1996 Jan 11 Cambridge, MA -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle ------- Space Shuttle Endeavour was launched on 1996 Jan 11, at 0941:00 UTC, beginning mission STS-72. Endeavour entered a 66 x 455 km x 28.5 deg transfer orbit at main engine cutoff (0949:35), followed by separation of the ET-75 external tank (0949:47). The OMS-2 apogee burn at 1024:30 placed the OV-105 spacecraft in a 180 x 460 km orbit. The NSR rendezvous burn tomorrow will place Endeavour on track to meet up with the SFU satellite, currently in a 469 x 478 km x 28.5 deg orbit. The Japanese National Space Development Agency's Space Flyer Unit (SFU) was launched by an H-II rocket in Mar 1995. A NASDA astronaut, Koichi Wakata, is a member of the STS-72 crew. The STS-72 launch was unusual in that for the first time there was no mission requirement for a transatlantic landing (TAL) abort site, since with a single engine failure the Orbiter could have made it either to orbit or back to the Cape at all times during the ascent. Two engine failures might have caused the crew to go to the Banjul, Gambia, site since the weather was bad at the mission's nominal TAL site at Ben Guerir, Morocco. Payloads on STS-72 include the Spartan 206 satellite (known also as OAST Flyer) and the EDFT-3 spacewalk experiment. Errata ------- In JSR 271A, the Start launch fell on Russia, not the Sea of Okhotsk as originally reported. NIITT should read MITT - Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology. Gals-2 was procured and delivered on orbit to Land by AO Informkosmos, so change owner to Informkosmos/Land. The UNAMSAT was built by Moscow State University for UNAM. Molniya-3 is probably owned by MSvyazi (Russian Federation Ministry of Communications). Finally, it is more accurate to call the Foton and Resurs buses 'Zenit', instead of 'Vostok', the design is ultimately derived from the Vostok and Zenit spacecraft first built in 1960-63. In JSR 271B, the Israeli Shaviyt was omitted from the summary table, and an extra Zenit appeared mysteriously. The totals should have read 80 launches, not 79. The Soyuz launchers are from TsSKB/Progress, not Energiya. Recent Launches -------------- IRS-1C raised its orbit on Jan 1 from 805 x 817 km to 816 x 818 km. The Skipper satellite (JSR270) will investigate UV emission from a body entering the Earth's atmosphere. It will dip in and out of the atmosphere in a low perigee orbit. (Thanks to Gunter Krebs for info). However, as of Jan 10 Skipper was still being recorded by Space Command in its original 804 x 813 km orbit. (To be more precise, there are three objects from the 1995-72 launch. Object A, identified as IRS, raised its orbit. Objects B and C, which I am assuming are Skipper and the 2BL rocket stage, are in the 804 x 813 km orbit. Space Command has not as far as I know identified either object as Skipper. It is possible that Skipper is actually a fourth, uncataloged object but at the moment I find this unlikely.) Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Dec 2 0808 SOHO Atlas IIAS Canaveral LC36B Astronomy 65A Dec 5 2118 USA 116 Titan 4 Vandenberg SLC4E Recon 66A Dec 6 2323 Telecom 2C ) Ariane 44L Kourou ELA2 Comsat 67A Insat 2C ) Comsat 67B Dec 14 0610 Kosmos-2323 ) Navsat 68A Kosmos-2324 ) Proton-K/DM2 Baykonur LC200L Navsat 68B Kosmos-2325 ) Navsat 68C Dec 15 0023 Galaxy IIIR Atlas IIA Canaveral LC36A Comsat 69A Dec 18 1431 Progress M-30 Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Cargo ship 70A Dec 20 0052 Kosmos-2326 Tsiklon-2 Baykonur LC90 Eorsat/Sci 71A Dec 28 0645 IRS-1C ) Molniya-M Baykonur LC31 Rem.sensing 72A Skipper ) Military 72B Dec 28 1150 Echostar 1 Chang Zheng 2E Xichang Comsat 73A Dec 30 1348 XTE Delta 7920 Canaveral LC17A Astronomy 74A Jan 11 0941 Endeavour Shuttle Kennedy LC39B Spaceship 01A Payloads no longer in orbit -------------------------- Nov 5 Columbia Landed at KSC Nov 18 Molniya-1 (80-92A) Reentered Nov 20 Atlantis Landed at KSC Dec 7 Galileo Probe Entered Jovian atmosphere Dec 11 Kosmos-398 Reentered over Pacific Dec 18 Kosmos-2305 Deorbited Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 2 STS-75 Feb 22 OV-103 Discovery Palmdale OMDP OV-104 Atlantis OPF Bay 1 STS-76 Mar 21 OV-105 Endeavour LEO STS-72 ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/ LC39B STS-72 ML2/ ML3/RSRM-53 VAB Bay 1 STS-75 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | 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 | | ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'