[JSR] Jonathan's Space Report, No. 652

Jonathan McDowell jcm at planet4589.org
Sun Jan 8 12:07:03 EST 2012


Jonathan's Space Report
No. 652                                        2012 Jan  8  Austin, Texas, USA
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Earth made its annual closest approach to the Sun at about 0030 UTC on Jan 5.
A happy perihelion to all my readers!

Space Station
-------------

Launch of the Soyuz TMA-03M spaceship from Baykonur with Oleg Kononenko,
Andre Kuipers and Don Pettit occurred on Dec 21. The ship docked
with the Rassvet module at 1519 UTC on Dec 23.

Meridian failure
-----------------

Launch of the fifth Meridian military communcations
satellite from Plesetk failed on Dec 23, once again putting the
Soyuz-2-1b launch vehicle in doubt. The Blok-I third stage
malfunctioned 7 min 1 s after launch, a couple of minutes short
of orbit insertion. Blok-I with the Fregat upper stage and the payload
crashed near Novosibirsk.

It has been reported that this was the first launch under the auspices
of the VVKO  (Voyska Vosdushno-Kosmicheskoi Oborona, Aerospace Defence
Forces), which on Dec 1 officially replaced the KVR (Russian Space
Forces), although Aleksandr Zheleznakyov (personal comm.) says that
the Nov 28 launch was actually the first for Voiska VKO. (The intermediate
launches were civilian ones performed by the Roskosmos).

GRAIL
-----

The GRAIL-A and GRAIL-B spacecraft entered lunar orbit on Dec 31 and Jan
1. The planned capture orbits were 88 x 8378 km x 87.2 deg for GRAIL-A,
and 111 x 8359 km x 88.3 deg for GRAIL-B. According to
spaceflightnow.com the actual orbit for GRAIL-A is 90 x 8362 km.
The GRAIL probes will now maneuver close to each other to begin their
gravity mapping mission.


Globalstar
-----------

Six Globalstar low orbit telecom satellites were launched on Dec 28 on a
Soyuz-2-1a from Plesetk. The successful launch by Roskosmos was a relief
coming only days after the Soyuz-2-1b failure, which may - perhaps -
be isolated to the RD-0124 engine that's unique to the 1b variant.
I don't yet have the serial numbers for the six satellites.


PSSC-2
------

The Aerospace Corporation's  PSSC Testbed 2 picosatellite, ejected from
mission STS-135, reentered on Dec 8. The 4 kg satellite carried four
tiny model-rocket motors to raise its orbit. One of those was fired on
Nov 4 at around 1530 UTC and raised the orbit slightly from 90.9 min,
317 x 319 km to 91.0 min, 316 x 329 km, delaying decay by about 4 days.
Based on the otherwise steady orbital decay rate, it appears that the
remaining motors were not fired.

ZY-1 02C
--------

China launched the Ziyuan yihao 02C satellite from Taiyuan on Dec 22.
The satellite carries imaging cameras with a resolution of 2.4m.
The two earlier ZY-1 satellites were launched as part of a joint
Sino-Brazilian program (CBERS), but this one appears to be all-Chinese.
China also has a ZY-2 series, thought to be used for defense related
imaging, while ZY-1 is used for civilian mapping and resource monitoring.

Tiangong and X-37
-----------------

The USAF's X-37B OTV spaceplane launched in Mar 2011 remains in orbit.
However, contrary to some recent media reports, its mission is unrelated
to observations of the Tiangong-1 spacelab; the orbital planes of
the two vehicles are perpendicular.


Erratum
-------

Of course, Cassini's been in Saturn orbit since 2004 Jul 1, not 2005 - that
should teach me not to send out JSR at 3am in future.


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

On Dec 23 the Russian Navy carried out a launch of two Bulava missiles
from the submarine Yuriy Dolgorukiy, according to Pavel Podvig's
site russianforces.org. Each missile carried
several (probably six) reentry vehicles which flew from the White Sea to
the Kura test range in Kamchatka.
On Dec 27, a UR-100NU rocket was launched from Baykonur to Kura
carrying an experimental reentry vehicle.


Table of Recent (orbital) Launches 
 ----------------------------------
Date UT       Name            Launch Vehicle  Site            Mission    INTL.  
                                                                          DES.
Nov  4 1251   Glonass-M No. 43) Proton-M/Briz-M    Baykonur LC81     Navsat    64A
              Glonass-M No. 44)                                      Navsat    64B
              Glonass-M No. 45)                                      Navsat    64C
Nov  8 2016   Fobos-Grunt       Zenit-2SB          Baykonur LC45    Mars probe 65A
Nov  9 0321   Yaogan Weixing 12) Chang Zheng 4B    Taiyuan           Imaging?  66B
              Tianxun 1        )                                     Imaging   66A
Nov 14 0414   Soyuz TMA-22      Soyuz-FG           Baykonur LC1      Spaceship 67A
Nov 20 0015   Shiyan Weixing 4 ) Chang Zheng 2D    Jiuquan           Tech?     68B
              Chuanxin 1-03    )                                     Tech      68A
Nov 25 1910   Asiasat 7         Proton-M/Briz-M    Baykonur LC200/39 Comms     69B
Nov 26 1502   MSL               Atlas V 541        Canaveral SLC41  Mars probe 70A
Nov 28 0826   Glonass-M No. 46  Soyuz-2-1B         Plesetsk LC43     Navsat    71A
Nov 29 1850   Yaogan Weixing 13 Chang Zheng 2C     Taiyuan           Radar?    72A
Dec  1 2107   Beidou DW10       Chang Zheng 3A     Xichang           Navsat    73A
Dec 11 1117   Amos  5  )        Proton-M/Briz-M    Baykonur          Comms     74A
              Luch 5A  )                                             DataRelay 74B
Dec 12 0121   JSE Reda-3 gouki  H-IIA 202          Tanegashima       Radar     75A
Dec 17 0203   Pleiades HR1 )    Soyuz ST-A         CSG ELS           Imaging   76A
              Elisa 1      )                                         Sigint    76
              Elisa 2      )                                         Sigint    76
              Elisa 3      )                                         Sigint    76
              Elisa 4      )                                         Sigint    76
              Fasat-Charlie)                                         Imaging   76
Dec 19 1641   Nigcomsat 1R      Chang Zheng 3BE    Xichang LC2       Comms     77A
Dec 21 1316   Soyuz TMA-03M     Soyuz-FG           Baykonur LC1      Spaceship 78A
Dec 22 0326   ZY-1 02C          Chang Zheng 4B     Taiyuan           Imaging   79A
Dec 23 1208   Meridian          Soyuz-2-1B         Plesetsk          Comms     F04
Dec 28 1709   Globalstar  )     Soyuz-2-1A         Baykonur LC31     Comms     80A
              Globalstar  )                                          Comms     80B
              Globalstar  )                                          Comms     80C
              Globalstar  )                                          Comms     80D
              Globalstar  )                                          Comms     80E
              Globalstar  )                                          Comms     80F

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

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


Nov  2 0750   RV               Jericho III        Palmachim           Test         300?
Nov  3 0645   RV               Topol'             Plesetsk            Test        1000?
Nov  6        NASA 36.264UH    Black Brant 9      White Sands         Astronomy    250?
Nov 15 0330   Agni RV          Agni IV            Chandipur           Test         900
Nov 17 1130   AHW Flight 1A    STARS              Kauai LC42          Hypersonic  1000?
Nov 25 2300   Orion V05        Orion              Natal               Test         100?
Nov 27 0910   TEXUS 48         VSB-30             Kiruna              Micrograv    270?
Dec  2 2200   VS30 V08         VS-30              Natal               Space sci?   173?
Dec  3 0721   ICI-3            VS-30/Orion        Svalbard            Auroral      354
Dec 19?       MR-30 payload    MR-30              Kapustin Yar        Test         304
Dec 23        RV x 6?          Bulava             K-535, White Sea    Salvo test  1000?
Dec 23        RV x 6?          Bulava             K-535, White Sea    Salvo test  1000?
Dec 27 1200   RV               UR-100NU           Baykonur            Test        1000?

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