Jonathan's Space Report<br />No. 482 2002 Jun 25, Cambridge, MA<br />-------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br /><br />Shuttle and Station<br />--------------------<br /><br />The STS-111 (Station Utilization Flight-2) mission is now complete,<br />and Expedition 5 crew members Valeriy Korzun, Peggy Whitson and <br />Sergei Treshchev remain aboard the Station.<br /><br />Some details on STS-111 in this issue are repeated from JSR 481, with<br />updated values. (I was on travel during part of the mission, and details<br />here are based on press reports, coverage by www.spaceflightnow.com, and<br />information kindly provided by Eddie Lyons.)<br /><br />Endeavour docked with the Station at 1625 UTC on Jun 7. The Leonardo<br />MPLM module was attached to the Station on June 8.On Jun 9, Chang-Diaz<br />and Perrin made a spacewalk from the Quest airlock. It was depressurized<br />at around 1522 UTC and the hatch was opened at 1524 UTC. The suits went<br />to battery power at 1527 UTC. The astronauts installed the PGDF grapple<br />fixture on the P6 truss, stowed some space debris shields on the PMA-1<br />adapter, and prepared the Mobile Base System (MBS) in the Shuttle cargo<br />bay. The hatch was closed at 2234 UTC and the airlock began<br />repressurization at 2242 UTC. MBS was unberthed sometime around 2220 UTC<br />and docked to the Mobile Transporter at 1304 UTC on Jun 10. On Jun 11 at<br />about 1515 UTC the Quest was depressurized again, with Chang-Diaz and<br />Perrin opening the hatch around the same time and going to battery power<br />at 1520 UTC. During this spacewalk the astronauts completed setting up<br />the MBS system. The hatch was closed at 2016 UTC and Quest was<br />repressurized at 2020 UTC. <br /><br />The third EVA was on Jun 13, again from the Quest airlock. Depress was<br />at 1512 UTC with hatch open probably at 1514 and battery power at 1516.<br />The astronauts replaced the wrist roll joint on the station's Canadarm-2<br />SSRMS robot arm; the old joint was stowed in Endeavour's cargo bay for<br />return to Earth. The hatch was closed at 2229 UTC and the airlock was<br />repressurized at 2233 UTC. At around 1918 UTC on Jun 14 the Shuttle RMS<br />unberthed the Leonardo logistics module from Unity and put it back in<br />the cargo bay, berthing it at 2011 UTC. On Jun 15 the hatches between<br />Shuttle and Station were closed at 1223 UTC, with the Ex-5 crew now<br />aboard Station and the Ex-4 crew on the Shuttle for the trip home.<br />Endeavour undocked at 1432 UTC, leaving the Station in a 389 x 399 km x<br />51.6 deg orbit following three reboost burns. After two days of bad<br />weather, Endeavour was diverted to Edwards AFB in California, with a<br />deorbit burn at 1650 UTC on Jun 19 lowering its orbit from 347 x 387 km<br />to 34 x 386 km. The Shuttle nominally entered the atmosphere around 1726<br />UTC and landed on runway 22 at Edwards at 1747 UTC.<br /><br />The next Shuttle mission is probably STS-107, which will fly an<br />independent research mission carrying out microgravity experiments.<br />However, launches are currently suspended pending investigation of<br />cracks found in Orbiter fuel lines.<br /><br />Recent Launches<br />---------------<br /><br />A Krunichev Proton-K put a Russian domestic communications satellite in<br />orbit on Jun 10. Ekspress A No. 4 was built by NPO PM and Alcatel for GP<br />Kosmicheskaya Svyaz', the Russian satcom operator, which calls the<br />satellite Ekspress A1R. According to an Energiya press release, the<br />Proton's parking orbit was off-nominal but the Energiya 11S861-01 Blok<br />DM-2M upper stage corrected for this and delivered the payload to the<br />correct orbit. Parking orbit was about 180 x 185 km x 51.6 deg; transfer<br />orbit after the first DM-2M burn was 328 x 36133 km x 47.4 deg; orbit at<br />spacecraft separation was 36102 x 36171 km x 0.2 deg. Two SOZ ullage<br />motors were left in the transfer orbit.<br /><br />Two Iridium replacement satellites, SV97 and SV98, were launched on Jun<br />20 at 0933 UTC by a Krunichev Rokot vehicle from Plesetsk. The mobile<br />telephone satellites are owned by Iridium Satellite LLC, the successor<br />to bankrupt Iridium LLC. The Rokot consists of the two-stage UR-100NU<br />ballistic missile with a Briz-KM upper stage based on the S5.92 engine<br />(originally flown on space probes like Fobos).<br /><br />Based on previous Rokot launches, the probable profile is that the<br />second UR-100NU stage burnt out and separated at 5 min after launch,<br />followed by a roughly 9 min Briz first burn to a transfer orbit of<br />roughly (120-200) x 660 km; at apogee the Briz then restarted at around<br />1040 UTC over the South Atlantic to enter a 658 x 669 km x 86.6 deg<br />orbit and deployed the two Iridium satellites. At roughly 1130 UTC Briz<br />then made a third burn to a 232 x 662 km x 86.6 deg disposal orbit from<br />where it will reenter quickly. However, I don't have any firm<br />information on the transfer orbit phase.<br /><br />Here is a list of the Briz upper stage launches to date:<br /><br />Date Launch vehicle Upper Stage Payload Notes<br /><br />1990 Nov 20 Rokot Briz-K - Suborbital test<br />1991 Dec 20 Rokot Briz-K Grand Prix Suborbital test<br />1994 Dec 26 Rokot Briz-K Radio-ROSTO <br />1999 Jul 5 Proton-K Briz-M No. 1L Raduga Launch failure<br />2000 May 16 Rokot Briz-KM IKA 1/2<br />2000 Jun 6 Proton-K Briz-M No. 2L Gorizont <br />2001 Apr 7 Proton-M Briz-M No. 3L Ekran-M <br />2002 Mar 17 Rokot Briz-KM GRACE 1/2<br />2002 Jun 20 Rokot Briz-KM Iridium 97/98<br /><br />The Galaxy 3C satellite was launched to geostationary transfer orbit by<br />a Sea Launch Zenit-3SL. The rocket took off at 2239:30 UTC on Jun 15<br />from the Odyssey floating launch platform at its standard 154W 0N<br />location. The Zenit second stage and the DM third stage with payload<br />entered a -2160 x 195 km suborbital trajectory at 2248:10. At about 2252<br />UTC the DM stage entered a 180 x 393 km x 0 deg parking orbit. A second<br />burn of the DM at 2324 to 2330 UTC put Galaxy 3C in a 358 x 41440 km x<br />0.02 deg transfer orbit This is a record low inclination for a<br />geostationary transfer orbit. The satellite's R-4D apogee engine will<br />put the Boeing BSS-702 satellite in geostationary orbit. The satellite<br />is the first 702 model to use extra solar panels instead of the solar<br />concentrators which ran into fogging problems on the earlier 702<br />flights.<br /><br />The Intelsat 905 satellite uses a new version of the venerable General<br />Dynamics R-4D bipropellant engine, the R-4D-15 HiPAT (High Performance<br />Apogee Thruster) with a thrust of 445N. The first two HiPATs were built<br />by Marquardt/Van Nuys, but new ones are built at GD's Redmond site.<br />By Jun 15, I-905 was in a 35642 x 35793 km x 0.1 deg geostationary<br />drift orbit at 26 deg W.<br /><br />Lockheed Martin launched Titan 23G-14, a refurbished Titan II missile,<br />from Vandenberg on Jun 24 at 1823 UTC. The two-stage Titan put the NOAA<br />M satellite on a suborbital trajectory of about -2500 x 820 km x 98 deg.<br />at 1829 UTC. At 1837 UTC the NOAA M propulsion module fired its<br />ATK/Thiokol Star 37XFP solid motor for the orbit insertion burn,<br />followed by a hydrazine trim burn to put the satellite in an 807 x 822<br />km x 98.8 deg operational orbit. NOAA M becomes NOAA 17 on entering<br />service with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as<br />the primary morning weather satellite, supplementing the NOAA 16 afternoon<br />satellite. Built by Lockheed Martin, NOAA M carries weather imagers and<br />microwave and infrared sounders, as well as a SARSAT search-and-rescue<br />package. It has an on-orbit mass of 1475 kg. <br /><br />Thanks to Igor Lissov for confirming the Kosmos-2389 launch time<br />of 1814:41 UTC.<br /><br />Table of Recent Launches<br />-----------------------<br /><br />Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL.<br /> DES.<br /><br />May 4 0131 SPOT 5 ) Ariane 42P Kourou ELA2 Imaging 21A<br /> Idefix ) Amateur radio 21B<br />May 4 0954 Aqua Delta 7920-10L Vandenberg SLC2W Rem.sensing 22A<br />May 7 1700 DirecTV-5 Proton-K/DM3 Baykonur LC81 Comms 23A<br />May 15 0150 Feng Yun 1D ) Chang Zheng 4B Taiyuan Weather 24B<br /> Hai Yang 1 ) Rem.sensing 24A<br />May 28 1525 'Ofeq-5 Shaviyt Palmachim Imaging 25A<br />May 28 1815 Kosmos-2389 Kosmos-3M Plesetsk Navigation 26A<br />Jun 5 0644 Intelsat 905 Ariane 44L Kourou ELA2 Comms. 27A<br />Jun 5 2122 Endeavour ) Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 28A<br /> Leonardo )<br />Jun 10 0114 Ekspress A1R Proton-K/DM2M? Baykonur LC200 Comms 29A<br />Jun 15 2239 Galaxy 3C Zenit-3SL Odyssey, POR Comms 30A<br />Jun 20 0933 Iridium SV97 ) Rokot/Briz-KM Plesetsk LC133 Comms 31A<br /> Iridium SV98 ) Comms 31B<br />Jun 24 1823 NOAA 17 Titan 23G Vandenberg SLC4W Weather 32A<br /><br />Current Shuttle Processing Status<br />_________________________________<br /> <br />Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due <br /> <br />OV-102 Columbia OPF STS-107 2002 Aug? Spacehab<br />OV-103 Discovery OPF Maintenance<br />OV-104 Atlantis OPF STS-112 2002 Aug? ISS 9A<br />OV-105 Endeavour Edwards STS-113 2002 Oct? ISS 11A<br /><br />.-------------------------------------------------------------------------.<br />| Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 |<br />| Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | |<br />| Astrophysics | |<br />| 60 Garden St, MS6 | |<br />| Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : jcm@cfa.harvard.edu |<br />| USA | jmcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu |<br />| |<br />| JSR: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html |<br />| Back issues: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/jsr/back |<br />| Subscribe/unsub: mail majordomo@head-cfa.harvard.edu, (un)subscribe jsr | <br />'-------------------------------------------------------------------------'