No 630 2010 Jul 17 Somerville, MA

Shuttle and Station

Soyuz TMA-19 undocked from Zvezda at 1913 UTC on Jun 28 and backed away to a distance of 30m, then flew around the station and redocked at the Rassvet module at 1938 UTC This freed the Zvezda port for the planned arrival of Progress M-06M, which was launched on Jun 30 At around 1630 on Jul 2 Progress M-06M approached the station, but radio interference caused the onboard computers to abort the rendezvous and the vehicle flew past at a distance of around 3 km It returned to ISS on Jul 4 and successfully docked at 1617 UTC

Progress M-04M had undocked from Zvezda on May 10 and moved to a 338 x 351 km orbit to carry out experiments It made one orbit maintenance burn on Jun 10, raising its orbit to 347 x 353 km On Jul 1 it completed its mission with a deorbit burn at 1354 UTC and impact in the south Pacific at 1440 UTC Progress M-05M remains docked to the Pirs module

Deep Impact

The Deep Impact Flyby Spacecraft, carrying out the EPOXI mission, flew past Earth on Jun 27 Closest approach of 30480 km was at 2203 UTC; the encounter changes DI's solar orbit from 0 97 x 1 03 AU x 6 6 deg to 0 98 x 1 22 AU x 3 2 deg and puts it on course to encounter comet 103P/Hartley-2 on Nov 4 DI was launched on 2005 Jan 12, delivered an impactor craft to 9P/Tempel-1 on 2005 Jul 4, and made previous Earth flybys on 2007 Dec 31 and 2008 Dec 29 Beginning in late 2007, it also carried out studies of extrasolar planets with its high resolution camera - congrats to my friends Sarah Ballard and Jessie Christiansen for their recent papers on the results (Astrophysical Journal 716, 1047 and 710, 97)

Rosetta

The Rosetta comet probe, on its way to Churyumov-Gerasimenko, flew past asteroid (21) Lutetia at a distance of 3162 km, at 1545 UTC on Jul 10 Lutetia is the largest asteroid yet visited by a spacecraft, with a size of roughly 100 km Lutetia is in a 2 04 x 2 83 AU x 3 1 deg orbit around the Sun; Rosetta is in a 0 98 x 5 09 AU x 4 4 deg orbit

Echostar XV

The Echostar XV satellite was launched on Jul 10 to provide Dish Network broadcasting An International Launch Services Proton-M/Briz-M put the Loral 1300 satellite in a 5981 x 35835 km x 18 7 deg transfer orbit By Jul 15 the satellite was in a 34421 x 35827 km x 0 3 deg orbit approaching geostationary status

PSLV

India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle made a successful flight from the Satish Dhawan Space Center on Sriharikota Island on Jul 12, placing the Cartosat 2B and Alsat-2A satellites in polar orbit Cartosat 2B is an imaging satellite for ISRO (the Indian Space Research Organization) with 0 8 meter resolution Alsat-2A was built by EADS Astrium for the Centre National des Techniques Spatiales of Algeria (which is possibly now part of the Agence Spatiale Algerienne, although I'm not fully clear on its organizational status), and carries a 2 5-meter resolution camera Also deployed by the PSLV-C15 mission were several smaller payloads: AISSat-1, built by UTIAS-Toronto for the Norwegian space center FFI with a ship-tracking payload; Studsat, a 1 kg picosatellite with a simple imager for remote sensing built by students in Bangalore and Hyderabad, and led by the Nitte Meenakshi Institute of Technology in Bangalore; and TISat-1 (Ticino Satellite 1), a 1 kg cubesat built by SUPSI (Scuola Universitaria Professionale della Svizzera Italiana) in the Italian-speaking Ticino region of Switzerland;

Suborbital flights

NASA flight 36 265UG carried the second flight of the CIBER-I infrared astronomy payload which will search for light from early galaxies The US Air Force flew a single reentry vehicle from Vandenberg to Kwajalein on Jun 30 using a Minuteman 3, the second such launch in two weeks On Jun 29, a 'foreign military asset' (possibly an R-17 Scud) was launched from the Missile Defense Agency's seaborne mobile launch platform in the Pacific and on reentry was intercepted at low altitude in the atmosphere by a THAAD missile

On 1960 Nov 23, Skylark SL49 was launched from Woomera carrying the first space experiment from Leicester University The Leicester group, led by Ken Pounds, went on to become one of the main UK space science teams, from the Ariel V satellite in the 1970s to participation in NASA's Swift mission today A conference to celebrate 50 years of the group was held at Leicester this month, and unluckily for those present I was there to record the reunion of X-ray astronomers young and old: http://www planet4589 org/jcm/trips/10/uk/part2/index html

Table of Recent (orbital) Launches

Date UT Name
Jun 2 0159 SERVIS 2 Jun 2 1553 Beidou DW4 Jun 3 2200 Arabsat 5B Jun 4 1845 Dragon Qual Unit Jun 10 0801 STSAT-2B Jun 15 0139 SJ-12 Jun 15 1442 Prisma-Mango ) Prisma-Tango ) Picard ) BPA-1 Jun 15 2135 Soyuz TMA-19 Jun 21 0214 Tandem-X Jun 22 1900? 'Ofeq-9 Jun 26 2141 Arabsat 5A ) Chollian ) Jun 30 1535 Progress M-06M Jul 10 1840 Echostar XV Jul 12 0352 Cartosat 2B ) Alsat 2A ) AISSAT-1 ) TISat-1 ) Studsat ) Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL DES Rokot Plesetsk LC133/3 Tech 23A Chang Zheng 3C Xichang Navigation 24A Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 25A Falcon 9 Canaveral SLC40 Test 26A Naro-1 Naro Tech F02 Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Science? 27A Dnepr Yasniy Tech 28B Tech 28B Solar phys 28A ) Navigation 28C Soyuz-FG Baykonur LC1 Spaceship 29A Dnepr Baykonur LC109 Radar 30A Shaviyt-1 Palmachim Imaging 31A Ariane 5ECA Kourou ELA3 Comms 32A Comms/Weather 32B Soyuz-U Baykonur LC1 Cargo 33A Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 34A PSLV-CA Sriharikota Imaging 35A Imaging 35D Navigation 35C Tech 35B Tech 35G

Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches

Date UT Payload/Flt Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission Apogee/km

Jun 6 2225 BVT-1? GBI Vandenberg Test 300? Jun 8 USN RV x 8? Trident II SSBN 738, ETR Op Test 1000? Jun 8 USN RV x 8? Trident II SSBN 738, ETR Op Test 1000? Jun 9 USN RV x 8? Trident II SSBN 738, ETR Op Test 1000? Jun 9 USN RV x 8? Trident II SSBN 738, ETR Op Test 1000? Jun 16 1001 GT200-GM1? Minuteman III Vandenberg LF10 Op Test 1300? Jun 24 1000 NASA 41 088UO Terrier Orion Wallops LA2 Education 120? Jun 29 0732 FTT-14 Target FMA (Scud?) MLP, Kauai Target 80? Jun 30 1040 GT201GM RV Minuteman III Vandenberg LF04 Op Test 1300? Jul 11 NASA 36 265UG Black Brant IX White Sands Astronomy 320?

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