Jonathan's Space Report No. 304 1996 Nov 16 Cambridge, MA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shuttle and Mir --------------- Launch of Shuttle mission STS-80 is now scheduled for Nov 19. The orbiter Columbia carries the ORFEUS 2 ultraviolet spectrometer telescope and the Wake Shield Facility subsatellite for making crystals in microgravity and high vacuum conditions. Also in the payload bay are a series of experiments to test equipment needed for Space Station construction, which will be used in two spacewalks during the mission. Recent Launches --------------- The Mars-96 spacecraft was launched on Nov 16 and is now on its way to Mars. The last successful Mars mission was Viking 2, which arrived at the planet in August 1976. The NASA Mars Observer mission and the two Soviet Fobos probes (targeted at the Martian moon Phobos) were all failures. Now NASA's Mars Global Surveyor and the Russian Space Agency's Mars-96 are both en route to the Red Planet, with NASA's Mars Pathfinder due to follow next month. The 8K82K Proton-K rocket, built by the Krunichev enterprise, took off from pad 200L at Kosmodrom Baykonur in Kazakstan at 2048:53 UTC on Nov 16. The Proton-K is a three stage rocket. Ten minutes after launch, the third stage separated from the payload which was at that point 145 km high on a suborbital trajectory. The payload included a fourth stage, the 11S824F Blok-D-2 built by RKK Energiya. The Blok-D-2 ignited at 2103 UTC and burnt out at 2105 UTC, placing itself and the attached space vehicle in a 148 x 158 km x 51.5 deg parking orbit around the Earth. At 2157 UTC the Blok-D-2 ignited again; it cut off at 2205 UTC with the orbit now approximately 200 x 314000 km x 51.8 deg, a very elliptical orbit stretching almost to lunar distance. The Blok-D-2 then separated from the Mars-96 space probe (Spacecraft M1 No. 520, built by the Lavochkin Association). The M1 spacecraft bus is based on the 1F spacecraft used for the Fobos missions, and includes an ADU propulsion unit. The ADU is used both for solar orbit insertion and for Mars orbit insertion. The ADU made its first burn just after the Blok-D-2 separated, at 2207 UTC. At 2210 UTC the ADU shut down, and Mars-96 was in solar orbit. The Mars-96 space probe will arrive at Mars on 1997 Sep 12, around the same time as Mars Global Surveyor. Four days before orbit insertion, it will release two small landers which will descend to the planet's surface. After Mars-96 enters Mars orbit, it will fire two penetrator probes into the surface, and lower its orbital period to enter an operational orbit of around 900 x 18200 km with a 12 hour orbital period. The Mars-96 space probe is operated by IKI (the Russian Space Research Institute) for the RKA (Russian Space Agency). Arianespace launched an Ariane 44L from Kourou on Nov 13. The rocket placed two satellites in geostationary transfer orbit. Arabsat 2B is an Aerospatiale Spacebus 3000 satellite which provides communications for the Arab League. It joins Arabsat 2A which was launched in July. Measat 2 is a Hughes HS-376 satellite, launched for the Malyasian telecom agency Binariang Sdn. Bhd. Measat 1 was launched in January. Table of Recent Launches ------------------------ Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. DES. Oct 20 0720 FSW-2 Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Remote sen. 59A Oct 24 1137 Molniya-3 Molniya-M Plesetsk Comsat 60A Nov 4 1709 SAC-B/HETE Pegasus XL Wallops Science 61A Nov 7 1700 MGS Delta 7925 Canaveral LC17A Mars probe 62A Nov 13 2240 Arabsat 2B ) Ariane 44L Kourou ELA2 Comsat 63A Measat 2 ) Comsat 63B Nov 16 2048 Mars-96 Proton-K Baykonur LC200L Mars probe Current Shuttle Processing Status ____________________________________________ Orbiters Location Mission Launch Due OV-102 Columbia LC39B STS-80 Nov 19 OV-103 Discovery OPF Bay 2 STS-82 Feb 13 OV-104 Atlantis OPF Bay 3 STS-81 Jan 12 OV-105 Endeavour Palmdale OMDP ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks ML1/RSRM-58 VAB Bay 3 STS-82 ML2/RSRM-54 VAB Bay 1 STS-81 ML3/RSRM-49/ET-80/OV-102 LC39B STS-80 .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Harvard-Smithsonian Center for | | | Astrophysics | | | 60 Garden St, MS6 | | | Cambridge MA 02138 | inter : jcm@urania.harvard.edu | | USA | jmcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu | | | | JSR: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/QEDT/jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html | | Back issues: ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.* | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'