Jonathan’s Space Report No. 604 2008 Dec 11
Shuttle and Station
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The Expedition 18 crew of Michael Fincke, Yuiry Lonchakov and Greg Chamitoff continued work on board ISS until the arrival of STS-126; after its departure and return to Earth with Chamitoff, Expedition 18 consists of Fincke, Lonchakov, and NASA’s Sandy Magnus.
Soyuz TMA-13 is docked to the Zarya port. Progress M-65 undocked from Zvezda at 1620 UTC on Nov 14, and remained in orbit until Dec 7 to continue ionospheric experiments. Progress M-01M was launched on Nov 26; the new spacecraft, serial no. 401, has a modernized digital control system. It docked with the Pirs module on Nov 30.
Endeavour entered in a 158 x 230 km orbit following launch on Nov 15 on mission STS-126, and docked with the PMA-2 unit on the Harmony module at 2201 UTC on Nov 16.
At 1709 UTC on Nov 17 the ISS robot arm (SSRMS) unberthed the MPLM-1 Leonardo module from Endeavour’s bay and by 1804 UTC it was attached to the Harmony module nadir port.
On Nov 18, Heidi Stefanyshyn-Piper and Steve Bowen made a spacewalk from the Quest module using EMU suits 3005 and 3003. Quest reached 50 mbar at around 1805 UTC, and the hatch was opened around 1808 UTC. The astronauts transferred an empty airlock nitrogen tank from the ESP-3 stowage pallet on the Station to the LMC carrier in Endeavour, and brought back to ESP-3 a new spare part, the Flexible Hose Rotary Coupler. They then began the major outdoor work of the mission, the cleaning and maintenance of the Solar Array Rotary Joint (SARJ) on the S3 truss segment. Trundle Bearing Assembly units were replaced and the SARJ ‘race ring’ was lubricated. At 2038 UTC Stefanyshyn-Piper’s 14 kg tool bag accidentally floated away; the work continued with spare tools. The astronauts returned to the airlock around 0050 UTC on Nov 19, with hatch closed at 0057 UTC and repressurization at 0101 UTC. The crew lock bag was cataloged as object 33442, 1998-067BL, and is in a 348 x 353 km orbit. One other ISS debris object is still aloft, a jettisoned thruster cover from EVA-20A on 2008 Jul 11; its orbit is 309 x 320 km.
EVA-2 was on Nov 20 by Stefanyshyn-Piper at Kimbrough, wearing EMU suits 3005 and 3018. They moved the two CETA equipment carts from the starboard to the port side of the Mobile Transporter, and carried out more SARJ maintenance. Depressurization to 50 mbar was at 1752 UTC and the hatch was open at 1757 UTC; hatch was closed at 0039 UTC on Nov 21 with repressurization at 0042 UTC.
The third spacewalk was on Nov 22 by Bowen and Stefanyshyn-Piper, wearing suits 3003 and 3005. Quest reached 50 mbar at about 1758 UTC with hatch open at 1800 UTC. The astronauts continued servicing the SARJ. Hatch was closed at 0052 UTC on Nov 23 with repressurization beginning at 0058 UTC.
EVA-4 was on Nov 24; Kimbrough and Bowen completed the SARJ work and installed an external TV camera and a GPS antenna to support docking of JAXA’s HTV cargo ship. Airlock depress was around 1819 UTC with hatch open at 1822 UTC; hatch close at 0029 UTC on Nov 25 with repressurization at 0031 UTC.
On Nov 26 the Leonardo module was returned from Harmony to Endeavour. Endeavour undocked at 1447 UTC on Nov 28. At 2033 UTC on Nov 29, the 7 kg PicoSat Solar Cell Testbed Experiment, PSSC Testbed, was deployed. It is a pathfinder for a later PSSC mission to geostationary transfer orbit to study radiation degradation of solar cells.
On Nov 29 at 2019 UTC Endeavour fired its OMS engines to reduce velocity by 89 m/s, putting it on a reentry path. The Shuttle landed on temporary runway 04L at Edwards AFB in California at 2125 UTC. (The main runway 04R/22L is being refurbished, and a new, shorter temporary runway is in place as 04L/22R.) On Dec 10 Endeavour began its trek back to Florida atop Shuttle Carrier Aircraft NASA 911.
Kosmos-2445
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Kosmos-2445 raised its orbit to 194 x 347 km on Nov 17.
Yaogan Weixing si hao
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The YW 4 satellite (Remote Sensing Satellite No. 4) was launched from China’s northern Jiuquan space center on Dec 1 into a 633 x 652 km x 97.9 deg orbit. As for YW 2, no launch vehicle stage was cataloged; it seems probable that the CZ-2D second stage makes a depletion burn after payload separation and reenters within a few orbits.
Kosmos-2446
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The Russian Defense Ministry launched an Oko (US-KS) elliptical orbit early warning satellite on Dec 2; it was given the cover name Kosmos-2446.
Ciel-2
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A Proton was launched from Baykonur on Dec 10 into a -497 x 175 km x 51.5 deg orbit. The Briz-M upper stage then reached orbits of 184 x 184 km, 277 x 5007 km, 334 x 16721 km, 421 x 35621 km and, after an inclination change to 19.5 deg, 5580 x 35612 km, where the Ciel-2 payload separated.
Ciel-2 is a Thales Alenia Spacebus 4000C4 with a mass of around 5600 kg, owned by Ciel Satellite Group, an Ottawa-based satellite TV operator. Ciel is currently using Echostar V. Control of Ciel-2 will be from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
Table of Recent (orbital) Launches
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Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL.
DES.
Oct 1 0637 THEOS Dnepr Yasniy Imaging 49A
Oct 12 0701 Soyuz TMA-13 Soyuz-FG Baykonur LC1/5 Spaceship 50A
Oct 19 1747 IBEX Pegasus XL Kwajalein Astronomy 51A
Oct 22 0052 Chandraayan-1 ) PSLV Sriharikota Lunar probe 52A
MIP ) Lunar probe 52
Oct 25 0115 SJ-6-03A) Chang Zheng 4B Taiyuan Unknown 53A
SJ-6-03B) Unknown 53A
Oct 25 0228 COSMO 3 Delta 7420-10 Vandenberg SLC2W Radar 54A
Oct 29 1654 Simon Bolivar Chang Zheng 3B Xichang Comms 55A
Nov 5 0015 Chuanxin-1-02 ) Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Tech 56A
Shiyan Weixing 3) Tech 56B
Nov 5 2044 Astra 1M Proton-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 57A
Nov 14 1550 Kosmos-2445 Soyuz-U Plesetsk LC16/2 Imaging 58A
Nov 15 0055 Endeavour STS-126) Space Shuttle Kennedy LC39A Spaceship 59A
Leonardo )
Nov 26 1238 Progress M-01M Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1/5 Cargo 60A
Nov 29 2033 PSSC Testbed - Endeavour, LEO Tech 59B
Dec 1 0442 Yaogan Weixing 4 Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Imaging? 61A
Dec 2 0500 Kosmos-2446 Molniya-M Plesetsk LC16/2 Early Warn 62A
Dec 10 1343 Ciel-2 Proton-M/Briz Baykonur Comms
I decided to include a table of suborbital launches as well, as an experiment.
Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches
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Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission Apogee/km
Nov 1 PacBlitz08 UNKNOWN Kauai Target 150?
Nov 1 Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-60, Kauai Intercept 150?
Nov 1 PacBlitz08 UNKNOWN Kauai Target 150?
Nov 1 Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-70, Kauai Intercept 150?
Nov 5 0900 GT198 RV-1 Minuteman 3 Vandenberg Op Test 1300?
Nov 12 0555 DRDO RV Shourya Chandipur R&D 200?
Nov 12? Iran RV Sejjil Semnan? R&D 300?
Nov 13 0906 M-51 RV-1 ) MSBS M51 Landes R&D 1000?
M-51 RV-2?)
M-51 RV-3?)
M-51 RV-4?)
M-51 RV-5?)
M-51 RV-6?)
Nov 14 NASA 36.221DS Black Brant 9 White Sands Solar phys. 300?
Nov 20 0221 Aegis Target UNKNOWN Kauai Target 150?
Nov 20 0224 Aegis JFTM-2 SM-3 DDG-176, Kauai Intercept 150?
Nov 26 Kavoshgar-2 Kavoshgar? Iran UNKNOWN R&D 150?
Nov 26 1320 RS-24 RV-1 ) Topol'-M Plesetsk R&D 1000?
RS-24 RV-2?)
RS-24 RV-3?)
Nov 28 RV-1 ) Bulava TK-208, Barents R&D 1000?
RV-2 )
RV-3 )
? ) (Number unknown)
Dec 5 1035 ARR ICI-2 VS-30/Orion Svalbard Auroral sci 330
Dec 5 2004 MDA FTG-05 Targ. Polaris STARS Kodiak Target 1000?
Dec 5 2021 MDA FTG-05 OBV Vandenberg Intercept 1000?
.-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | Jonathan McDowell | phone : (617) 495-7176 | | Somerville MA 02143 | inter : jcm@host.planet4589.org | | USA | jcm@cfa.harvard.edu | | | | JSR: http://www.planet4589.org/jsr.html | | Back issues: http://www.planet4589.org/space/jsr/back | | Subscribe/unsub: mail majordomo@host.planet4589.org, (un)subscribe jsr | '-------------------------------------------------------------------------'
