[JSR] Jonathan's Space Report, No. 631

Jonathan McDowell jcm at www.planet4589.org
Tue Aug 10 12:14:00 EDT 2010


Jonathan's Space Report
No. 631                                            2010 Aug 10 Somerville, MA
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shuttle and Station
-------------------

The Expedition 24 crew are commander Aleksandr Skvortsov and flight
engineers FE-2 Tracy Caldwell-Dyson, FE-3 Mikhail Kornienko, FE-4 Doug
Wheelock, FE-5 Fyodor Yurchikin, and FE-6 Shannon Walker. The Soyuz
TMA-18, Soyuz TMA-19, Progress M-05M, and Progress M-06M ships are
docked to the ISS. Thermal control system Loop A, one of the two
independent cooling systems on the Station, is currently shut down following
failure of its ammonia pumping system.

On Jul 27, FE-3 Kornienko and FE-5 Yurchikin carried out ISS spacewalk 
VKD-25 (Russian spacewalk 25) from the Pirs module. The airlock was
depressurized at around 0359 UTC, and the hatch opened at 0411. The
astronauts went to the aft end of Zvezda and replaced the old Klest-154
video camera with a new one. The camera is used to image the European
ATV cargo ships during  their approach to docking with Zvezda. They then
connected up cables between the new Rassvet module and the rest of the
station, and finally at 1040 UTC Yurchikin, standing near the Pirs
airlock, jettisoned the old Klest-154  into space. He and Kornienko then
went back inside, closing the hatch at 1054 UTC and repressurizing Pirs
at 1058 UTC, for a duration of 6h43m hatch open/close, and 6h59m depress/repress.
The Klest-154 is about 0.3m in size, but I don't know its mass. Three
objects were cataloged in orbit after the EVA; two of them were probably
the camera, and a cable bundle handle that floated free at 0545 UTC.

On Jul 31, a pump module on the S1 truss failed, forcing some of the
Station's equipment to be shut down. The module is a key component in
the Station's cooling system loop A and was launched integrated with S1
in Oct 2002 on mission STS-112. A similar module on the P1 truss,
launched Nov 2002 on STS-113, is still operating as part of the backup
cooling loop B. There are four spares on the Station: the third pump
module was launched on mission STS-121 in Jul 2006 and installed on the
ESP-2 spares platform during a spacewalk on 2006 Jul 10. On mission
STS-127 a fourth module was carried up, and installed on the ESP-3
spares platform on 2009 Jul 20. Two further modules are on the ELC-1 and
ELC-2 logistics carriers on P3 and S3, launched in 2009 on STS-129. The
pressurized modules where the astronauts live are cooled by a
water-based system which is still working, but the ammonia cooling loops
keep the  equipment on the station's truss cool, particularly the
electrical power generation equipment used to run all the experiments;
so, even if the second loop also failed, the habitable modules wouldn't
directly overheat, but the station would lose power, so NASA considers
it urgent to repair the system.


On Aug 7 Wheelock and Caldwell-Dyson made a spacewalk from the Quest
airlock in suits EMU 3005 and 3009 respectively.  The airlock was
depressurized (0.7 psi at 1114 UTC) and at 1117 UTC the hatch was
opened. The intention was to replace the S1 pump module with the spare
PM on ESP-2. In the event, problems removing the inaptly named 'quick
disconnects' on the ammonia plumbing delayed the operation, which will
be continued in subsequent spacewalks. Leaking ammonia flakes from the
fluid lines sprayed near the astronauts, but their suits were not
seriously contaminated. The astronauts returned to the airlock and
closed the hatch at about 1911 UTC with repressurization at 1922 UTC,
after checking for ammonia contamination. The official NASA spacewalk
time was 8hr 3 min; actual time below 0.7psi was about 8hr 8min, of
which only 7hr 11min was spent outside the airlock. A second repair
spacewalk is expected on Aug 11.


Kosmos-2462
-----------

Russia's Kobal't-M class imaging satellite, Kosmos-2462, completed its
mission on Jul 21 and landed in either Russia or Kazakhstan at around
0910 UTC.  The spacecraft made its last orbit raising burn on Jul 11, to
186 x 348 km x 67.1 deg. On Jul 18 it lowered its orbit from 183 x 330
km to 182 x 279 km, in preparation for landing; three debris pieces were
also tracked briefly in orbit around Jul 20. The spacecraft is thought
to carry two small recoverable film capsules; the second was presumably
ejected shortly before the Jul 18 burn, while the first may have been
recovered on or around Jun 9. Plausible capsule deorbit times on
descending passes over Russia are 2010 Jun 9 at about 0425 and 2010 Jul
17 at about 1720 UTC, with recoveries circa 30 min later. Lifetime of
Kosmos-2462 was 96 days, within the range of 76-107 days seen on the 5
earlier Kobal't-M missions between 2004 and 2009.

Beidou
-------

The fifth ('di wu ke') Beidou Daohang Weixing (North Star Navigation
Satellite) was launched from Xichang on Jul 30 by a CZ-3A rocket. It is
the first Beidou targeted for an inclined geosynchronous orbit. The CZ-3A was
launched on an azimuth of around 140 deg, not used previously from
Xichang, and entered a circa 190 x 400? km x 55 deg parking orbit about
ten minutes after launch. The third stage then restarted after a brief 4
minute coast, to enter a 189 x 35850 km x 55.1 deg transfer orbit. BDW5
used its onboard engine to circularize its path on Aug 2; by Aug 4 it
was in a 35652 x 35959 km x 55.1 deg orbit.

Japan is planning to launch the Michibiki satellite into a somewhat
similar orbit next month. After the early Syncom test satellites at 34
deg, the first highly inclined circular-orbit geosynchronous satellites
were the LES 8 and 9 military communications satellites (1976) at 25
deg. More recently the Solar Dynamics Observatory entered a 28 deg
orbit. The IUE and SDO observatories and the Sirius Radio satellites
have used elliptical inclined 24-hour orbits.


Ariane L554
-----------

Arianespace launched vehicle L554 - an Ariane 5ECA model - from Kourou
on Aug 4 carrying two African satellites, both built by Thales Alenia
Space (Cannes) using the Spacebus 4000 platform. Nilesat 201, for the
Egyptian Nilesat organization, has a launch mass of 3200 kg and a
Ku-band/Ka-band broadcasting payload. Rascom-QAF-1R has Ku and C band
payloads for telecom, broadcasting and internet service to Africa for
RASCOM, the Regional African Satellite Communications Organization; it
has a launch mass of 3050 kg. The mission saw the first use of the Sylda
5K  dual-launch adapter, an enlarged version of the usual Sylda 5A.
Nilesat 201 sat on top of the Sylda during launch with RASCOM stashed
inside it.

The Ariane 5 core stage flew to a -1441 x 259 km x 9.2 deg transfer
trajectory. The ESC-A upper stage completed its burn at 2123 UTC and
deployed the satellites into a 260 x 35770 km x 2.0 deg geostationary
transfer orbit.

Yaogan
------

China's Yaogan Weixing shi hao (YW-10) satellite was launched by
a CZ-4C from Taiyuan on Aug 9 into a 607 x 621 km x 98.7 deg orbit.
Video of the launch included a payload illustration which suggests that
the satellite carries a radar imaging instrument.


Suborbital flights
------------------

The SUMI (Solar Ultraviolet Magnetograph Investigation) payload was
launched on flight NASA 36.213NS from White Sands on Jul 30 -
congratulations to my friend Jonathan Cirtain who led the development of
this instrument. The French Navy launched an MSBS M51 missile from the
coast of Bretagne into the Atlantic on Jul 10, and the Russian Navy
launched two Sineva missiles from the submarine K-114 Tula on Aug 6.

Black Brant X flight NASA 12.073GT, launched on Aug 4, was a
qualification test of the Nihka solid motor, reported by NASA Wallops as
'a new manufacturing run with some minor design changes'. The Black
Brant X consists of a Terrier booster and Black Brant sustainer, just
like the Black Brant IX, but with a Nihka third stage. Planned apogee
was 691 km. The '12' series NASA sounding rocket launches are 
experimental and one-off rocket tests; the first was NASA 12.01GT in May
1961, which tested a nosecone on a Nike booster. Regular BB X launches
are in the NASA '35' series.



Table of Recent (orbital) Launches 
 ----------------------------------
Date UT       Name            Launch Vehicle  Site            Mission    INTL.  
                                                                          DES.
Jun  2 0159   SERVIS 2            Rokot            Plesetsk LC133/3 Tech       23A
Jun  2 1553   Beidou DW4          Chang Zheng 3C   Xichang          Navigation 24A
Jun  3 2200   Arabsat 5B          Proton-M/Briz-M  Baykonur LC200/39 Comms     25A
Jun  4 1845   Dragon Qual Unit    Falcon 9         Canaveral SLC40  Test       26A
Jun 10 0801   STSAT-2B            Naro-1           Naro             Tech       F02
Jun 15 0139   SJ-12               Chang Zheng 2D   Jiuquan          Science?   27A
Jun 15 1442   Prisma-Mango )      Dnepr            Yasniy           Tech       28B
              Prisma-Tango )                                        Tech       28B
              Picard       )                                        Solar phys 28A
              BPA-1        )                                        Navigation 28C
Jun 15 2135   Soyuz TMA-19        Soyuz-FG         Baykonur LC1     Spaceship  29A
Jun 21 0214   Tandem-X            Dnepr            Baykonur LC109   Radar      30A
Jun 22 1900?  'Ofeq-9             Shaviyt-1        Palmachim        Imaging    31A
Jun 26 2141   Arabsat 5A )        Ariane 5ECA      Kourou ELA3      Comms      32A
              Chollian   )                                       Comms/Weather 32B
Jun 30 1535   Progress M-06M      Soyuz-U          Baykonur LC1     Cargo      33A
Jul 10 1840   Echostar XV         Proton-M/Briz-M  Baykonur LC200/39 Comms     34A
Jul 12 0352   Cartosat 2B )       PSLV-CA          Sriharikota      Imaging    35A
              Alsat 2A    )                                         Imaging    35D
              AISSAT-1    )                                         Navigation 35C
              TISat-1     )                                         Tech       35B
              Studsat     )                                         Tech       35G
Jul 31 2130   Beidou DW5          Chang Zheng 3A   Xichang          Navigation 36A
Aug  4 2059   Nilesat 201 )       Ariane 5ECA      Kourou           Comms      37A
              RascomQAF-1R)                                         Comms      37B
Aug  9 2249   Yaogan Weixing 10   Chang Zheng 4C   Taiyuan          Radar      38A

Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches
----------------------------------

Date UT     Payload/Flt Name  Launch Vehicle  Site            Mission    Apogee/km

Jun  6 2225   BVT-1?          GBI              Vandenberg      Test        300?
Jun  8        USN RV x 8?     Trident II       SSBN 738, ETR   Op Test    1000?
Jun  8        USN RV x 8?     Trident II       SSBN 738, ETR   Op Test    1000?
Jun  9        USN RV x 8?     Trident II       SSBN 738, ETR   Op Test    1000?
Jun  9        USN RV x 8?     Trident II       SSBN 738, ETR   Op Test    1000?
Jun 16 1001   GT200-GM1?      Minuteman III    Vandenberg LF10 Op Test    1300?
Jun 24 1000   NASA 41.088UO   Terrier Orion    Wallops LA2     Education   120?
Jun 29 0732   FTT-14 Target   FMA (Scud?)      MLP, Kauai      Target       80?
Jun 30 1040   GT201GM RV      Minuteman III    Vandenberg LF04 Op Test    1300?
Jul 10 0732   RV x 6?         MSBS M51      S614, Baie d'Audierne  Test   1000?
Jul 11 0450   NASA 36.265UG   Black Brant IX   White Sands     IR Astron   320?
Jul 30 1821   NASA 36.213NS   Black Brant IX   White Sands     Solar EUV   246?
Aug  4 0915   NASA 12.073GT   Black Brant X    Wallops I.      Test        693?
Aug  6        RV x4?          Sineva         Tula, Barents     Op Test    1000?
Aug  6        RV x4?          Shtil'?        Tula, Barents     Op Test    1000?

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|  Jonathan McDowell                 |  phone : (617) 495-7176            |
|  Somerville MA 02143               |  inter : jcm at www.planet4589.org    |
|  USA                               |          jcm at cfa.harvard.edu       |
|                                                                         |
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