Jonathan's Space Report No. 134 1992 Nov 24 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Discovery is on Pad 39A awating launch on mission STS-53. This mission will deploy a classified reconnaissance satellite for the National Reconnaissance Office and a group of small radar calibration satellites called ODERACS. The mission will be commanded by David Walker. Pilot is Robert Cabana and mission specialists are Guion Bluford, Jim Voss and Mike Clifford. The MSTI-1 (Miniature Seeker Technology Integration) satellite was launched into a 331 x 443 km polar (96.8 deg) orbit by Scout S210C from Space Launch Complex 5 at Vandenberg Air Force Bace at 1345 UTC on Nov 21. The MSTI-1 is operated by the USAF Phillips Lab for the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO) and was built by JPL. It carries an IR camera which will be used for imaging ground targets. The mission is intended as a test of the new small spacecraft bus. Navstar GPS 32 was launched on Nov 22 by Delta from Launch Complex 17 at Cape Canaveral. The Rockwell-built navigation satellite, placed into an initial 160 x 20340 km transfer orbit inclined 34.7 deg, will be placed in a 20000 km high orbit and carries atomic clocks to provide navigation signals. This was the 30th launch of McDonnell Douglas' Delta II launch vehicle. All 30 launches have been successful, an unrivalled record. Kosmos-2220 was launched on Nov 20 by Soyuz from Plesetsk. It is an imaging recon satellite operated by Russian military intelligence, replacing Kosmos-2210 which was launched in September. Kosmos-2210 was expected to complete its mission around Nov 20 and reenter. Kosmos-2220 will remain in orbit until about Jan 20. The Resurs-500 spacecraft was recovered from the Pacific Ocean off Seattle by the ship Marshal Krylov on Nov 22. The spacecraft, owned by Konsortsium Evropa-Amerika 500, had been launched from Plesetsk on Nov 15. Launches: Date Payload Rocket From Nov 15 2150? Resurs-500 Soyuz Plesetsk 75A Nov 17 0750? Kosmos-2219 Zenit Baykonur 76A Nov 20 1540? Kosmos-2220 Soyuz Plesetsk 77A Nov 21 1345 MSTI-1 Scout Vandenberg 78A Nov 22 2354 Navstar GPS 32 Delta 7925 Canaveral 79A Reentries: Date Nov 1 1406 Columbia Nov 1 CTA Nov 5 Kosmos-756 Nov 22 Resurs-500 Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 2 STS-55 OV-103 Discovery LC39A STS-53 OV-104 Atlantis Palmdale OMDP OV-105 Endeavour VAB Bay 1 STS-54 ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/STS-53/ET/OV-103 LC39A ML2/STS-54/ET/OV-105 VAB Bay 1 ML3/STS-55 VAB Bay 3 .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS4 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | USA | | '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------'