Jonathan's Space Report 31 Oct 1991 (no.93) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The Galileo probe passed less than 1600 km from minor planet (951) Gaspra at 2237 UT on 1991 Oct 29. Data from the encounter will be stored on board and returned to Earth in late 1992. Atlantis was moved to pad LC39A on Oct 24. The STS-44 mission will be a military one; the Defense Support Program early warning satellite will be deployed on an IUS upper stage, and US Army payload specialist Tom Hennen will participate in the Terra Scout and M88-1 experiments to see what a trained imagery analyst can see from orbit. [Question to my readers: can anyone who knows about military stuff explain to an ignorant civilian what a Chief Warrant Officer 3 is and how it relates to the ranks other military astronauts have like Major, Captain, etc?] The Mir/Kvant/Sofora/Kvant-2/Kristall/Soyuz TM-13/Progress M-10 complex continues in orbit with crew Aleksandr Volkov and Sergey Krikalyov. The robot cargo ship Progress M-10 docked with Mir on Oct 21. This is a longer interval than normal between launch and docking and may indicate continuing problems with the rendezvous antenna. According to the weekly listing issued by NASA-Goddard, satellite 21225, the Compton Observatory (GRO), reentered on Oct 12. However, the folks down the hall assure me they're still getting data from it, so we can safely assume the report is a typo. Remember, never believe anything you read, even from an official source. Meanwhile, the USAF/NASA Combined Release and Radiation Effects Satellite, CRRES, has apparently failed in orbit. The chemical release part of the mission was complete but more data on the space radiation environment had been hoped for. The Foton materials processing spacecraft landed in Kazakhstan on Oct 20 after 16 days in orbit. A geostationary satellite was launched by Proton from Baykonur on Oct 23. Soviet geostationary satellite programs include Raduga (government communications), Gorizont (TV relay), and various classified Kosmos programs. I don't know which this one is yet. ___________________________________ |Current STS status: | |Orbiters | | | |OV-102 Columbia Palmdale | |OV-103 Discovery OPF Bay 3 | |OV-104 Atlantis LC39A | |OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 1 | | | |ML/ET/SRB stacks | | | |ML1/STS-44/ET/OV-104 LC39A | |ML2 | |ML3?/STS-42 VAB Bay 1 | ----------------------------------- N.B. Information in this report is obtained from public sources and does not reflect the official views of NASA. .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (205)544-7724 | | Space Science Lab ES65 | | | NASA Marshall Space Flight Center | | | Huntsville AL 35812 | inter : mcdowell@xanth.msfc.nasa.gov | | USA | | '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------'