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Jonathan's Space Report
No. 691 draft 2013 Dec 6, Somerville, MA
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International Space Station
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Expedition 38 continues with commander Oleg Kotov, and flight engineers
FE-2 Sergey Ryazanskiy, FE-3 Michael Hopkins, FE-4 Mikhail Tyurin, FE-5
Rick Mastracchio and FE-6 Koichi Wakata. Ferry ship Soyuz TMA-10M is at
Poisk and TMA-11M is at Rassvet. Cargo ship Progress M-20M is at the
Pirs module and Progress M-21M is at the Zvezda module.
SES-8
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SpaceX carried out its first geostationary transfer launch on Dec 3.
Payload was the SES-8 satellite, a 3100-kg Orbital Star-2.4 for SES
World Skies. The second flight of the uprated Falcon 9 v1.1, and its
first from Cape Canaveral, appears to have been a complete success.
After reaching parking orbit the second stage reignited at 2308 UTC and
placed SES-8 in a 423 x 79977 km x 20.47 deg supersynchronous transfer
orbit. SpaceX does not appear to have released the parameters of the
parking orbit but it appears to have been around 300 x 400 km x 28.5
deg. [Note: this analysis is based on the tracking data which was
probably taken at high altitudes, so the perigee estimate may be
inaccurate]. Around 1545 UTC on Dec 5 SES-8 reached first apogee and raised
its orbit to 14401 x 80416 km x 6.2 deg.
Inmarsat 5F1
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Inmarsat PLC's first Inmarsat 5 satellite, carrying the Ka-band Global XPress
communications payload, was launched from Baykonur on Dec 8.
The Inmarsat 5 satellites, with 6090 kg launch mass, are BSS-702HP models
built by Boeing/El Segundo.
The Proton reached a -495 x 170 km orbit and the first Briz burn put
the stack in a 173 x 173 km parking orbit. Further burns
delivered I5-F1 to a 4306 x 64809 km x 26.7 deg supersynchronous transfer orbit
via intermediate orbits of 295 x 6000 km, 360 x 14847 km, and 475 x 65044 km.
CBERS 3
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A new China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite was launched on Dec 9.
Zi Yuan 1 No. 3 was launched from Taiyuan Space Center.
Brazilian sources initially reported the launch was a success, but
it now appears that the CZ-4B rocket failed to reach orbit. A news
story on globo.com cited in nasaspaceflight.com reports that stage
3 cutoff was 11 seconds too early. I estimate an approximate
orbit of around -150 x 720 km x 98.5 deg, with impact in
the Antarctic around 0407 UTC; however, the uncertainties are
large and this estimate could be way off.
Chang'e-3
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Chang'e-3 is in lunar polar orbit. On Dec 10 at 1320 UTC the orbit was lowered
from 100 x 100 to 15 x 100 km.
Landing on the lunar surface is scheduled for Dec 14 at 1535 UTC.
The CZ-3B third stage rocket was launched to a 311 x 352280 km x 29.6
deg orbit which passed close to the Moon at around 1100 UTC on Dec 6
and, according to tracking by astronomers, is currently in a 106000 x
662000 km x 35.8 deg orbit around the Earth-Moon system. See Bill Gray's
page at http://www.projectpluto.com/pluto/mpecs/che3.htm for details.
Table of Recent (orbital) Launches
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Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL.
Nov 5 0908 Mars Orbiter Spacecraft PSLV-XL Sriharikota Mars probe 60A
Nov 7 0414 Soyuz TMA-11M Soyuz-FG Baykonur LC1 Spaceship 61A
Nov 11 2346 Raduga-1M Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC81/24 Comms 62A
Nov 18 1828 MAVEN Atlas V 401 Canaveral SLC41 Mars probe 63A
Nov 19 1218 PicoDragon ) ISS, LEO Tech 98-067DA
Ardusat-1 ) Tech 98-067DB
Ardusat-X ) Tech 98-067DC
Nov 20 0115 STPSAT-3 ) Minotaur I Wallops I LA0B Tech 64A?
ORS-3 ) Tech 64
TJ3Sat ) Tech 64
DragonSat ) Tech 64
COPPER ) Tech 64
ChargerSat 1 ) Tech 64
SwampSat ) Tech 64
Ho'oponopono 2 ) Radar cal 64
KySat-2 ) Tech 64
CAPE 2 ) Tech 64
Trailblazer ) Tech 64
Vermont Lunar Cubesat ) Tech 64
PhoneSat-2.4 ) Tech 64
NPS-SCAT ) Tech 64
Black Knight 1 ) Tech 64
Firefly ) Science 64
Horus/STARE-B ) Space Surv. 64
SENSE-A ) Ionospheric 64
SENSE-B ) Ionospheric 64
ORSES ) Comms 64
ORS Tech 1 ) Tech 64
ORS Tech 2 ) Tech 64
Prometheus 1A? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 1B? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 2A? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 2B? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 3A? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 3B? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 4A? ) Comms 64
Prometheus 4B? ) Comms 64
Nov 20 0331 Yaogan 19 Chang Zheng 4C Taiyuan Imaging 65A
Nov 20 0758 TechEdSat-3p ISS, LEO Tech 98-067DD
Nov 21 0710 Dubaisat-2 ) Imaging 66D
SkySat-1 ) Dnepr Yasniy Imaging 66C
STSat-3 ) Astronomy 66G
AprizeSat-7 ) Comms 66A
AprizeSat-8 ) Comms 66K
WNISAT-1 ) Weather 66H
Lem ) Astronomy 66R
GOMX-1 ) Comms 66Q
Dove-3 ) Imaging 66P
Delfi-3nXt ) Tech 66N
Triton 1 ) Comms/AIS 66M
KHUSAT-1 ) Science 66J
KHUSAT-2 ) Science 66L
OPTOS ) Tech 66E
Manolito ) Tech 66AB
Krysaor ) Tech 66AA
UWE-3 ) Tech 66
VELOX-P2 ) Tech 66
First-MOVE ) Tech 66
FUNcube-1 ) Tech 66
HINCube-1 ) Tech 66
Tshepiso ) Tech 66
BPA-3 ) Tech 66AJ
Unisat-5 ) Tech 66F
Dove-4 ) Imaging 66
ICUBE-1 ) Tech 66
PUCPSat-1 ) Tech 66
Pocket-PUCP ) Tech 66
HUMSAT-D ) Tech 66
QBScout-1 ) Tech 66
BeakerSat-1 ) Tech 66
$50SAT ) Tech 66
WREN ) Tech 66
Nov 22 1202 SWARM-1 ) Rokot Plesetsk Science 67A
SWARM-2 ) Science 67B
SWARM-3 ) Science 67C
Nov 25 0212 Shiyan 5 Weixing Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Tech/Sci? 68A
Nov 25 2053 Progress M-21M Soyuz-U Baykonur LC31 Cargo 69A
Dec 1 1730 Chang'e-3 ) Chang Zheng 3BE Xichang Moon probe 70A
Yutu ) Rover
Dec 3 2241 SES-8 Falcon 9 v1.1 Canaveral SLC40 Comms 71A
Dec 6 0714 TOPAZ 3? ) Atlas V 501 Vandenberg SLC3E Radar 72A
Aerocube 5a ) Tech 72D
Aerocube 5b ) Tech 72E
SMDC-ONE 2.3) Comms 72N
SMDC-ONE 2.4) Comms 72L
Tacsat 6 ) Tech? 72M
ALICE ) Tech 72F
SNAP-3 ) Tech? 72G
FIREBIRD A ) Sci 72B
FIREBIRD B ) Sci 72C
MCubed-2 ) Tech/Imaging 72H
IPEX ) Tech 72K
CUNYSAT 1 ) Sci 72J
Dec 8 1212 Inmarsat 5 F1 Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 73A
Dec 9 0326 ZY-1 No. 3 Chang Zheng 4B Taiyuan Imaging F03
Suborbital launches
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Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches
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Date UT Payload/Flt Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission Apogee/km
Nov 3 0925 NASA 36.294UH Black Brant IX White Sands X-ray Astron 280?
Nov 12 1615? SL-8 SpaceLoft XL Spaceport America Tech 116
Nov 20 1140 NASA 36.296UG Black Brant IX White Sands UV Astron 277
Nov 27 0350 NASA 36.261UG Black Brant IX White Sands UV Astron 280?
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| Jonathan McDowell | |
| Somerville MA 02143 | inter : planet4589 at gmail |
| USA | twitter: @planet4589 |
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