Jonathan's Space Report No. 164 1993 Aug 11 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Shuttle ------- Launch of STS-51 has been delayed until at least Aug 12 because of the Perseids. Payloads are the ACTS communications satellite and the ORFEUS astronomy satellite. Meanwhile, the STS-58 stack is awaiting the rollover of Columbia from the processing facility to the VAB; stacking of solid rocket boosters for the STS-60 mission has begun in the VAB; and preparation of Endeavour for the STS-61 mission is continuing in the processing facility. Mir --- Tsibliev and Serebrov continue in orbit aboard the Mir complex. Launch of the Progress M-19 cargo freighter was due on Aug 10. Obituary: Milton Thompson (1926-1993) -------- NASA-Dryden Chief Engineer Milt Thompson died on Aug 6. Milton Orville Thompson, born on 4 May 1926, was a NASA test pilot from 1956 (when it was still NACA) until 1967. He trained as an astronaut in the (later cancelled) military X-20 Dyna-Soar program from 1962 to 1963, and made 14 flights in the X-15-1 and X-15-3 spaceplanes. He also was a leading force in the early days of the lifting body program, and was the first pilot of the original M2-F1 lifting body demonstrator and the rocket-powered M2-F2. Milt Thompson is the person who came closest to flying in space without actually doing so: he is the only person ever to have flown into the mesosphere (above the stratopause at about 50 km) without making it above the 80 km limit that is becoming the accepted boundary of space by space historians. On May 25, 1965 he flew mission 1-54-88 aboard the X-15-1 from Mud Lake, Nevada to Edwards AFB and reached 54.8 km apogee. He made a second flight into the mesosphere on Aug 25, 1965 (mission 1-57-96) from Delamar Dry Lake, Nevada to Edwards, this time reaching 65.2 km. His fastest flight was in Jan 1965, when he reached almost 6000 km/hr (Mach 5.4) in the X-15-3. Launches -------- NOAA-13 (formerly NOAA-I) was launched on Aug 8 from Space Launch Complex 3 at Vandenberg by an Atlas E (probably serial number 34E, can anyone confirm this?). The NOAA satellites are polar orbiting weather satellites used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA-13 is an Advanced TIROS-N model; the NOAA series is the continuation of the original TIROS series of weather satellites started by NASA in 1960. A Molniya-3 communications satellite was launched into highly elliptical orbit with a 12 hour period on Aug 4 from Plesetsk. Few details of the Titan 4 failure have so far emerged. A correspondent reports that visual observations indicate the second generation NOSS satellites consist of a pair fixed about 50 km apart, with a third satellite between them but moving from side to side, reaching distances of over 100 km from the pair. Date Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Jul 1 1433 Soyuz TM-17 Soyuz 2 Baykonur Spaceship 43A Jul 8 0715 Kosmos-2258 Tsiklon-M Baykonur EORSAT 44A Jul 14 1640 Kosmos-2259 Soyuz Plesetsk Recon 45A Jul 19 2204 DSCS III Atlas AC-104 Canaveral Comsat 46A Jul 22 0856 Kosmos-2260 Soyuz Plesetsk Remote sens. 47A Jul 22 2258 Hispasat 1B ) Ariane 44L Kourou Comsat 48A Insat 2B ) Comsat 48B Aug 2 1959 Adv NOSS 3? Titan 403 Vandenberg Recon FTO Aug 4 Molniya-3 Molniya Plesetsk Comsat 49A Aug 8 1002 NOAA 13 Atlas 34E? Vandenberg Weather Reentries --------- Jul 1 Endeavour Landed at Kennedy Space Center Jul 1 EURECA Returned to Earth aboard Endeavour Jul 4 Progress M-18 Deorbited Jul 4 Raduga capsule Landed in Russia Jul 12 Resurs-F1 Landed in Kazakhstan? Jul 18 MSTI-1 Reentered Jul 22 Soyuz TM-16 Landed in Kazakhstan Jul 25 Kosmos-2259 Landed Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission OV-102 Columbia OPF Bay 2 STS-58 OV-103 Discovery LC39B STS-51 OV-104 Atlantis Palmdale OMDP OV-105 Endeavour OPF Bay 1 STS-61 ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/RSRM-34/ET-57 VAB Bay 3 STS-58 ML2/RSRM-35 VAB Bay 1 STS-60 ML3/RSRM-33/ET-59/OV-103 LC39B STS-51 Shuttle Processing Explanation (or, what are all these acronyms anyway?): The Shuttle consists of an Orbiter (OV), an expendable External Tank (ET), and a reusable pair of Redesigned Solid Rocket Motors (RSRM). The OV is prepared for flight in the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) which consists of three bays (one of which is actually a separate building) after which it is towed to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) and `mated to the stack' or joined to the ET and RSRM. First, the segments of the RSRM are stacked up on a Mobile Launch Platform (ML) and then the ET is connected to it. After the OV is mated, a Crawler-Transporter is moved underneath the ML and carries the ML/RSRM/ET/OV stack to one of the two pads (A or B) at launch complex 39 (LC39) where it is eventually launched on a Space Transportation System (STS) mission. Occasionally an OV is returned to the Rockwell International plant in Palmdale, California for refit - an Orbiter Maintenance Down Period or OMDP. .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS4 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : jcm@urania.harvard.edu | | USA | | '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------'