Jonathan's Space Report
No. 843 draft 2025 Feb 19 Somerville, MA
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Annual Report
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The 2024 annual report is available at https://planet4589.org/space/papers/space24.pdf
Latest corrected version is v1.4, if you downloaded an earlier version please replace it.
JSR Fundraiser
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The JSR Fundraiser at
https://www.gofundme.com/f/fund-jonathans-space-report-library-transition
has now raised over $100K. I am profoundly moved and grateful for all your
support.
I am looking at several properties in the south of England as possible homes,
but nothing solid (or affordable) yet. I'll keep you all posted.
International Space Station
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Expedition 72 continues with Suni Williams (ISS commander), Barry Wilmore, Aleksey Ovchinin, Ivan Vagner,
Don Pettit, Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov.
Progress MS-28 reboosted the ISS orbit at 0130 UTC Feb 20 with a 2.0 m/s burn.
Progress MS-28 undocked from Zvezda at about 2017:33 UTC Feb 25, made
a deorbit burn at 2325 UTC Feb 25, and reentered over the S Pacific at
around 0006 UTC Feb 26.
Progress MS-30 was launched on Feb 27 and docked with the ISS Zvezda module at 2302:30 UTC Mar 1.
Starlink
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Starlink Group 12-14 (23 sats) was launched on Feb 21 from Canaveral.
Starlink Group 15-1 (22 sats) was launched on Feb 23 from Vandenberg.
Starlink Group 12-13 (21 sats) was launched on Feb 27 from Canaveral.
Starlink Group 12-20 (21 sats) was launched on Mar 3 from Canaveral.
CALT launches
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CALT launched a CZ-3B from Xichang on Feb 22, carrying the Zhongxing-10R communications sat to geotransfer orbit.
CALT launched a CZ-2C from Jiuquan on Feb 27, carrying the Siwei Gaojing 1-03 and 1-04 commercial imaging satellites
to 1330 LTDN sun-sync orbit.
CALT launched a CZ-3B from Xichang on Mar 9, carrying the TJS 15 satellite to geotransfer orbit.
Chinese launch failure
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On Mar 1, a launch vehicle, probably a Kuaizhou-1A, exploded within moments of ignition at Jiuquan.
No further details are available.
IM-2
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On Feb 27 SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 from Kennedy to a lunar-apogee transfer orbit. The primary payload
was Intuitive Machines' IM-2 Athena lunar lander. Secondary payloads deployed from an ESPA ring on the second
stage were AstroForge's Odin asteroid probe, the Caltech/JPL Lunar Trailblazer lunar orbiter, and
Epic Aerospace's Chimera GEO-1.
Chimera, built in Buenos Aires and Montevideo, is a 301 kg space tug which will maneuver from
the lunar transfer orbit to GEO. This is just an extreme version of the fairly common supersynchronous
transfer orbit technique, leveraging the low velocity at apogee to make the inclination change
to equatorial. Once in GEO it will deploy a currently-secret commercial 16U cubesat for an unknown
customer from an unknown country. Chimera made a lunar flyby on Mar 3 but its current status is not known.
Lunar Trailblazer (LTB) targeted a 100 km low lunar orbit and carries a neutron spectrometer to map water abundance.
Mass of the probe is 210 kg including propellant. However, LTB ran into problems soon after
launch and now appears dead. It was not able to perform lunar orbit insertion.
LTB made a 457 km lunar flyby at 1204 UTC Mar 3. It will depart the Earth's Hill sphere
on Mar 26 and enter a 1.00 x 1.09 AU x 0.2 deg solar orbit.
Athena carries a set of experiments including
three rovers: IM's own Grace hopper rover (39 kg), Lunar Outpost's MAPP rover (10 kg), and Dymon Co.'s
Yaoki rover (0.5 kg). Launch mass of Athena was 2120 kg, presumably including the rovers. Dry mass
is likely around 650 kg.
Athena entered lunar orbit on Mar 3 at 1227 UTC. Insertion was directly
to a 100 km low lunar polar orbit. It performed descent orbit insertion
(DOI) at 1033 UTC Mar 6 to a 10 x 100 km orbit, followed by powered
descent initiation (PDI) at 1714 UTC. Athena landed near Mons Mouton
(Liebnitz Beta) at 31W 85S at 1728:50 UTC Mar 6. It continued to
communicate after landing, but there are indications that the lander may
not be upright.
Odin's mission was to include a flyby of the potentially metal-rich asteroid 2022 OB5. The asteroid is in
a 0.95 x 1.07 AU x 2.1 deg solar orbit, and probably has a diameter of order 10 metres. Odin is
105 kg wet 77 kg dry, about 0.7m across with 3.5m solar panel span, and carries a Dawn Aerospace
N2O-propellant SpaceDrive thruster package. Odin ended up in a tumble after launch
and controllers are attempting to recover control of the spacecraft.
Odin made a 108 km lunar flyby at 1206 UTC Mar 3, sending it to a 0.99 x 1.06 AU x 0.4 deg solar orbit;
it will depart the Earth's Hill sphere on Mar 22.
Trajectory data for Athena and Chimera are, regrettably, not available.
Blue Ghost
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Firefly's Blue Ghost 1 landed on the Moon on Mar 2. It manuevered from 106 x 106 km
to 20 x 100 km with a DOI burn at 0800 UTC, followed by PDI at 0823 UTC and landing
at 0834 UTC at 18.56N 61.81E near Mons Latreille in Mare Crisium.
Glonass
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Russia launched the Glonass-K2 No. 14L satellite (Kosmos-2584) on Mar 2.
Ariane
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The second Ariane 6 was launched on Mar 6 and deployed France's CSO 3 spy sat into sun-synch orbit.
The upper stage was successfully deorbited over the Indian Ocean.
Starship
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The eighth Starship test flight was launched on 2025 Mar 3 from Starbase using Booster 15 and Ship 34.
The Booster successfully returned for a tower catch. The Ship again failed late in the
ascent burn, and was destroyed over the Bahamas.
Four Starlink simulators were carried, and would have been used to test the dispenser.
Erratum
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The launch date for Starlink 11-4 was wrong in the text of JSR 842, but correct in the table.
Table of Recent Orbital (and near-Orbital) Launches
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Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. Catalog Perigee Apogee Incl Notes
Feb 11 0209 Starlink Group 11-10 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 29 275 x 288 x 53.2
Feb 11 0930 HWD 2-01 to 2-09 Chang Zheng 8A Wenchang LC201 Comms 30 860 x 871 x 50.0
Feb 11 1853 Starlink Group 12-18 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 31 285 x 292 x 43.0
Feb 15 0614 Starlink Group 12-8 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 32 285 x 291 x 43.0
Feb 18 2317 BlackSky Gen3 Electron Mahia LC1B Imaging 33A 466 x 476 x 59.0
Feb 18 2321 Starlink Group 10-12 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 34 273 x 284 x 53.2
Feb 21 1519 Starlink Group 12-14 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 35 272 x 279 x 43.0
Feb 22 1211 Zhongxing-10R Chang Zheng 3B Xichang Comms 36A 212 x 35732 x 27.7
Feb 23 0138 Starlink Group 15-1 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 37 265 x 280 x 70.0
Feb 27 0016 IM-2 Athena Falcon 9 Kennedy LC39A Lunar 38A 212 x 367501 x 28.5
Lunar Trailblazer Lunar 38C 212 x 367501 x 28.5
Odin Deep 38D 212 x 367501 x 28.5
Chimera GEO-1 Tug 38B 212 x 367501 x 28.5
Feb 27 0334 Starlink Group 12-13 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 39 283 x 292 x 43.0
Feb 27 0708 Siwei Gaojing 1-03 Chang Zheng 2C Jiuquan Imaging 40A 489 x 505 x 97.3
Siwei Gaojing 1-04 Imaging 40B
Feb 27 2124 Progress MS-30 Soyuz-2-1a Baykonur LC31 Cargo 41A 138 x 221 x 51.7
Mar 1 1001 Unknown payload Kuaizhou-1A? Jiuquan Unk F02 -6378 x 0 x 97
Mar 2 2222 Kosmos-2584 Soyuz-2-1b/Fregat Plesetsk Nav 42A 19140 x 19154 x 64.8
Mar 3 0224 Starlink Group 12-20 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 43 284 x 291 x 43
Mar 6 1624 CSO 3 Ariane 62 Kourou ELA4 Imaging 44A 783 x 783 x 98
Mar 6 2330 Starship FT8 Starship Starbase OLP1 Test F03 -3600? x 146 x 26
Mar 9 1717 TJS 15 Chang Zheng 3B Xichang Unk 45A
Table of Recent Suborbital Launches
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NS-30, using capsule First Step and booster 4, carried six tourists to space on Feb 25.
Date UT Payload Rocket Site Mission Apogee Target
Feb 19 0900 GT252 Minuteman 3 Vandenberg LF09 Op.Test 1300? Kwajalein
Feb 25 1549 NS-30 New Shepard West Texas Tourist flight 107 West Texas
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| Jonathan McDowell | |
| Somerville MA 02143 | inter : planet4589 at gmail |
| USA | twitter: @planet4589 |
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