Jonathan’s Space Report No. 450 – 9 Apr 2001

Shuttle and Station

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The International Space Station remains in operation, with the
Expedition 2 crew of Usachev, Voss and Helms aboard.

The next Space Shuttle mission is STS-100, scheduled for Apr 19
using orbiter OV-105 Endeavour. It will carry out International
Space Station Flight 6A which will continue the outfitting of
the Station.

Here is an initial estimate of what’s in the STS-100 payload
bay; corrections welcome.

STS-100 cargo: The JSR guess

                                               Est. Mass (kg)

Bay 1-2:     Orbiter Docking System                     1800

             and External Airlock

             3 EMU spacesuits (S/N unknown)              360?

Unknown:     Adapter Beam with                           100?

                DCSU switching unit

Bay 5?:      Spacelab Pallet                            1400

	     with SSRMS (Space Station Remote           1500

               Manipulator System)

                  LDA

                  UHF Antenna                             56?

Bay 8-12?:   Rafaello Module (MPLM-2)                   4800?

             MPLM racks and cargo                       5400?

Unknown      Adapter Beam with IMAX Camera               238

Sill:        Canadarm RMS 303?                           410

                                                      ——

                      Total payload bay cargo          16064 kg

Recent Launches

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The first Krunichev Proton-M was launched at 0447 UTC on Apr 7. The
improved 3-stage Proton launch vehicle, with a new digital flight
control system and enhanced first stage engines, delivered its payload
section to a suborbital trajectory at 0456 UTC. The Briz-M upper stage
then fired to enter a 200 km parking orbit. Although initial Proton-M
literature indicated the Briz-M usually uses a further 3 burns to reach
geostationary orbit, it appears that only two more burns were used on
this occasion: one at around 0540 UTC to enter a 200 x 35800 km GTO,
after which the Briz-M toroidal drop tank was probably jettisoned, and
one at around 1100 UTC, to circularize the orbit at geostationary
altitude. Briz-M reportedly separated from its payload at 1131 UTC.
Space Command had not cataloged the three orbiting objects by early Apr
8. Anatoly Zak tells me he has unconfirmed data that the initial parking
orbit insertion may have been at 0508 UTC, implying an extremely long
Briz-M first burn, which may have partly compensated for the lack of an
intermediate burn.

The payload was Ekran-M No. 18, a UHF television broadcasting satellite
which will be stationed at 99 deg E. The first Ekran-M was launched in
1987 replacing the original model Ekrans which were first launched in
1977, and have provided television service to the Russian Far East since
that time. The satellite has a launch mass of around 2100 kg and
will replace Ekran-M No. 20 which was launched in 1992 and is operating
far beyond its design life.

The 2001 Mars Odyssey probe was launched on Apr 7 into solar orbit.
Formerly the Mars Surveyor 2001 Orbiter, this is the first spacecraft in
the revamped NASA Mars Exploration Program. Built by Lockheed Martin
Astronautics (Denver) and JPL, the satellite is similar to Mars Climate
Orbiter. It carries a 6-meter boom with a gamma ray spectrometer for
remote sensing of Martian surface mineralogy, as well as an infrared
imager and a radiation environment monitor. Mars Odyssey (the “2001”
seems to be dropped in informal use) will reach Mars orbit in October.
The probe has a dry mass of 376 kg and carries 349 kg of propellant.

2001 Mars Odyssey was launched by a Boeing Delta 7925 from Cape
Canaveral and entered a 195 x 215 km x 52 (?) deg parking orbit 10 min
after launch. After a 12 minute coast the Delta second stage fired again
and separated from the third stage, which placed the probe on an Earth
escape trajectory. The second stage’s final orbit was 177 x 1805 km x
40.0 deg, the lowered inclination probably the result of the depletion burn.

Table of Recent Launches

———————–

Date UT       Name            Launch Vehicle  Site            Mission    INTL.

                                                                          DES.

Mar  8 1142   Discovery (STS-102) Shuttle      Kennedy LC39B    Spaceship  10A

              Leonardo                                          Module

Mar  8 2251   Eurobird  )       Ariane 5G      Kourou ELA3      Commsat    11A

              BSAT-2a   )                                       Commsat    11B

Mar 18 2233   XM-2 Rock         Zenit-3SL      Odyssey,Pacific  Commsat    12A

Apr  7 0447   Ekran-M No. 18    Proton-M       Baykonur LC81/24 Commsat

Apr  7 1502   2001 Mars Odyssey Delta 7925     Canaveral SLC17A Mars probe 13A

Current Shuttle Processing Status

_________________________________

Orbiters               Location   Mission    Launch Due   

OV-102 Columbia        OPF Bay 1     STS-109 2001 Nov 19  HST SM-3B

OV-103 Discovery       OPF Bay 2     STS-105 2001 Jul 12  ISS 7A.1

OV-104 Atlantis        OPF Bay 3     STS-104 2001 Jun  7  ISS 7A

OV-105 Endeavour       LC39A         STS-100 2001 Apr 19  ISS 6A

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|  Jonathan McDowell                 |  phone : (617) 495-7176            |

|  Harvard-Smithsonian Center for    |                                    |

|   Astrophysics                     |                                    |

|  60 Garden St, MS6                 |                                    |

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