From: mailto: Jonathan's Space Report

No 833 2024 May 21 Somerville, MA

International Space Station

Expedition 71 continues

Spacewalk ISS VKD-62 (Expedition 71) was carried out on 2024 Apr 25 by Kononenko and Chub in suits MKS-5 and MKS-4 The crew removed an experiment platform from the airlock and stowed it outside, then translated to the nadir of the Nauka module to adjust the Napor-miniRSA antenna panel and get some 'Test' swab samples Next at Poisk, the Biorisk-MSN1 container 2 was retrieved An RK-21-8 adapter was removed from the URM-D workstation on Zvezda plane 2 and transferred to Poisk; the experiment platform and the adapter were installed on the side of Poisk opposite from the EVA hatch The astronauts adjusted the orientation of the BKDO device

Next, the crew took the Kvartz-M and TKK-KM (Perspektiva) units from the airlock and installed them on the just-installed adapter After connecting cabling to the new units, they returned to the airlock

Hatch open time was 4h36 m (1457 UTC to 1933 UTC); depressurized time was 4h 55m

On Apr 26 at 0235 UTC Progress MS-26, which is docked at the Zvezda aft port, fired its engines for a 0 6 m/s, 403s burn to reboost the station's orbit by 1 km

Dragon CRS-30 undocked from IDA-3 at 0043 UTC on Apr 30 and landed in the Tampa recovery zone in the Gulf of Mexico at 0538 UTC Apr 30 The trunk was jettisoned prior to deorbit, probably in a 196 x 379 km orbit

Dragon Endeavour, with Crew-8 aboard, undocked from IDA-2 at 1257 UTC May 2 and redocked with IDA-3 at 1346 UTC

Chinese Space Station

Shenzhou 18 was launched on Apr 25 at 1259 UTC with a crew of three: Ye Guangfu, Li Guangsu and Li Cong The ship docked with the nadir port on Tianhe at 1932 UTC

The previous crew of Tang Hongbo, Tang Shengjie and Jiang Xinlin boarded Shenzhou 17 for the trip home on Apr 29 Shenzhou 17 undocked from the Tianhe forward port at 0043 UTC Apr 30 The orbital module was jettisoned at 0856 UTC prior to the deorbit burn at 0857 UTC The propulsion module was jettisoned at 0920 UTC, with reentry at 0928 UTC Shenzhou 17 landed at the Dongfeng landing site at 0946:08 UTC Apr 30

Galileo

Two EU Galileo navigation satellites FOC FM 25 and FM 27 (GSAT0225 and GSAT0227), were launched on a Falcon 9 on Apr 28 from Kennedy Space Center The first stage, on its 20th flight, was expended in the Atlantic Ocean The first burn of the second stage reached a 168 x 23176 km x 54 7 deg transfer orbit, and its second burn circularized the orbit at 22928 x 22985 km x 54 7 deg

The launch was rather secretive with no information available about the launch profile (number and timing of burns), rather pointlessly as one can reconstruct that info fairly well from the Space Force orbital data As far as I can tell, the EU also did not release any photos of the satellites during launch prep The secrecy seems likely to be associated with political embarrassment that Europe had to turn to SpaceX for a launch opportunity following the delays to Ariane 6, and therefore deserves to be ridiculed

Starlink

Starlink Group 6-54 (23 sats) was launched from Canaveral on Apr 28 Starlink Group 6-55 (23 sats) was launched from Canaveral on May 3 Starlink Group 6-57 (23 sats) was launched from Canaveral on May 6 Starlink Group 6-56 (23 sats) was launched from Kennedy on May 8 Starlink Group 8-2 (20 sats) was launched from Vandenberg on May 10 Starlink Group 6-58 (23 sats) was launched from Canaveral on May 13 Starlink Group 8-7 (20 sats) was launched from Vandenberg on May 14 Starlink Group 6-59 (23 sats) was launched from Canaveral on May 18

SAST launches

SAST launched the first Chang Zheng 6C from Taiyuan on May 7, putting two radar satellites and two small optical imaging satellites in orbit The venting upper stage left a long trail in the sky seen from the US Midwest

Haiwangxing-01 is an X-band radar satellite operated by Zhihui Kongjian Jishu YG (Ningbo) Zhixing-1C is another X-band radar satellite operated by Zhixing Kongjian Keji YG (Beijing) The optical satellites, a wide field of view sat and a high res video sat, are operated by the Harbin Inst of Technology

SAST launched a CZ-4C from Jiuquan on May 11, placing the experimental satellite Shiyan 23 in a 600 km, 06:00 LTDN sun-synch orbit The CZ-4C upper stage made a small perigee lowering burn at 0013 UTC May 12, changing the rocket stage's orbit from 592 x 601 km to 449 x 596 km

SAST launched a CZ-2D from Taiyuan on May 20, placing four Beijing-3C imaging satellites in orbit for 21AT Co Ltd to 1015 LTDN SSO

CAST launches

CAST launched a CZ-3B from Xichang on May 9 with two Zhihui Tianwang 1-01 internet satellites reportedly to be placed in a 20000 km orbit The high altitude venting of the third stage was visible as a comet like object over much of the Americas The satellites are operated by Qingshen Keji Fazhan YG of Shanghai

The third stage is in a 210 x 20771 km x 53 0 deg orbit; as of May 17 no orbit data have been released for the payloads

Legion

Maxar's WorldView Legion 1 and 2 commercial imaging satellites were launched on a Falcon 9 on May 2

Chang'e-6

China launched the Chang'e-6 lunar probe on May 3 on a translunar trajectory Chang'e-6 is planned to be the first mission to return rock samples from the lunar farside to the Earth

Chang'e-6 entered a 200 x 8600 km lunar orbit at 0212 UTC May 8 The Pakistani ICUBE-Q cubesat was ejected from Chang'e-6 at 0814 UTC May 8

Axiom-3 Trunk

The Dragon Axiom Ax-3 flight visited the ISS and was launched on 2024 Jan 18 and landed on Feb 9 It jettisoned its trunk section into a 233 x 393 km orbit on Feb 9 just before it deorbited itself That trunk section, catalog 58953, reentered at 1117 UTC on Feb 26 over Saskatchewan In late April a large (about 50 kg) piece of the trunk was discovered in a field near Ituna, Saskatchewan This event is reminiscent of the impact on 2022 Jul 8 of another large trunk piece from the Crew-1 Dragon mission on a farm in Dalgety, New South Wales, and confirms that the trunks do not fully `demise' (burn up) on reentry

Kosmos launch

On May 16 Russia launched a Soyuz-2-1B/Fregat from Plesetsk to a 1300 LTDN sun-sync orbit carrying a Minisrty of Defense satellite and a set of commercial rideshare payloads The Soyuz-2-1B Blok-I stage was suborbital and impacted the Pacific near 128W 27N at about 2150 UTC

The Fregat stage circularized the orbit at 440 km, and deployed a satellite with the cover name Kosmos-2576 It is suspected to be Nivelir-L No 4, an inspector satellite, and its mission may be to shadow a US NRO satellite, USA 314, which is in the same orbital plane

Next, possibly at 0320 UTC May 17, the Fregat made two burns to move to a higher 780 km orbit to deploy three Byuro 1440 'Rassvet-2' internet satellites with 5G comm relay and intersatellite links,

Following that, possibly at 0502 UTC May 17, Fregat made two more burns to lower orbit to 550 km and deployed two 12U Zorkiy-2M imaging cubesats and four 3U SITRO-AIS cubesats for the Sputnix company,

Bob Christy (orbitalfocus uk) forwarded me a NOTAM which indicates that the Fregat was then deorbited over the Indian Ocean at about 0730 UTC May 17

Kosmos-2553 and the Russian Space Nuclear Weapon program

In February US officials began talking about an alleged weapons development program by Russia involving detonating a nuclear weapon in space (something that was last done in 1962 by both the US and USSR, and is now generally considered to be a Bad Idea ) There were hints that a test satellite related to this program, although not actually carrying nukes, had been launched

On May 4 the State Dept 's Mallory Stewart gave a speech with a handful of additional details of the test satellite that the US is worried about: orbit not used by any other spacecraft',region of higher radiation but not high enough to allow accelerated [radiation exposure testing] as Russia has claimed' As first pointed out on social media by Pavel Podvig of the Russian Nuclear Forces Project (russianforces org), this makes it clear that the satellite in question is Kosmos-2553

The Russian Defense Ministry satellite codenamed Kosmos-2553 was launched on 2022 Feb 5 by Soyuz-2-1a from Plesetsk and placed in an unusual 1996 km high orbit at the top edge of LEO The orbit has an inclination of 67 1 degrees, a frequently used slot for Plesetsk-based military launches to lower orbits The satellite made some small ( less than 1 km ) orbit adjustments until 2022 Jun 3, and none thereafter

Kosmos-2553 is generally suspected to be the NPOMash 14A01 Neitron radar satellite, the successor to the Kondor program whose satellites flew in much lower 500 km orbits It is not clear what (classified) evidence the US has that would make them think this satellite is related to a nuclear weapons program

Table of Recent Orbital Launches

Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL Catalog Perigee Apogee Incl Notes Apr 10 0540 Starlink Group 6-48 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 68 284 x 292 x 43 0 Apr 11 0900 GMM KA Angara A5/Orion Vostochniy 1A Tech 69A 36051 x 36470 x 0 1 Gagarinets Tech 69B 196 x 450 x 51 7 Dummy cubesat Tech 69C 196 x 450 x 51 7 Apr 11 0905 CURTIS ISS, LEO Tech 98067WF 413 x 420 x 51 6 Apr 11 1035 Kashiwa ISS, LEO Tech 98067WG 413 x 420 x 51 6 MicroOrbiter-1 Tech 98067WH 413 x 420 x 51 6 Apr 11 1425 WSF-M SV1 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Weather 70A 819 x 828 x 98 7 Apr 13 0140 Starlink Group 6-49 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 71 283 x 291 x 43 0 Apr 15 0412 Siwei Gaojing 3-01 Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan Imaging 72A 489 x 503 x 97 5 Apr 17 2126 Starlink Group 6-51 Falcon 9 Kennedy LC39A Comms 73 284 x 292 x 43 0 Apr 18 1126 Snoopi ISS, LEO Science 98067WJ 407 x 413 x 51 6 BurstCube Astron 98067WK Apr 18 1136 HyTI Imaging 98067WL Apr 18 1755 Killick-1 Science 98067WM QMSAT Tech 98067WN Violet Science 98067WP Apr 18 1805 BigRedSat Tech 98067WQ Apr 18 2240 Starlink Group 6-52 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 74 284 x 292 x 43 0 Apr 20 2345 Yaogan 42-02 Chang Zheng 2D Xichang Imaging? 75A 491 x 502 x 35 0 Apr 23 2217 Starlink Group 6-53 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 76 284 x 292 x 43 0 Apr 23 2232 NeonSat-1 Electron Mahia 1B Imaging 77A 517 x 541 x 97 4 ACS3 Tech 77B 998 x 1028 x 97 4 Apr 25 1259 Shenzhou 18 Chang Zheng 2F Jiuquan Spaceship 78A 196 x 336 x 41 5 Apr 28 0034 Galileo FOC FM25 Falcon 9 Kennedy LC39A Nav 79A 22928 x 22985 x 54 7 Galileo FOC FM27 Nav 79B Apr 28 2208 Starlink Group 6-54 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 80 284 x 292 x 43 0 May 2 1836 WorldView Legion 1 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Imaging 81A 515 x 521 x 97 6 WorldView Legion 2 Imaging 81B 514 x 518 x 97 6 May 3 0237 Starlink Group 6-55 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 82A 284 x 292 x 43 0 May 3 0927 Chang'e-6 Chang Zheng 5 Wenchang LC101 Lunar probe 83A 267 x 386843 x 24 5 May 6 1636 Starlink Group 6-57 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 84A 284 x 292 x 43 0 May 7 0321 Haiwangxing-01 Chang Zheng 6C Taiyuan Radar 85A 491 x 510 x 97 4 Zhixing-1C Radar 85B 491 x 510 x 97 4 Kuanfu Guangxue Imaging 85C Gaofen Shipin Imaging 85D May 8 1842 Starlink Group 6-56 Falcon 9 Kennedy LC39A Comms 86 312 x 320 x 43 0 May 9 0143 Zhihui Tianwang 1-01A Chang Zheng 3B Xichang Comms 87A 210 x 20773 x 53 2 Zhihui Tianwang 1-01B Comms 87B May 10 0430 Starlink Group 8-2 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 88 285 x 295 x 53 2 May 11 2343 Shiyan 23 Chang Zheng 4C Jiuquan Tech 89A 591 x 601 x 97 8 May 13 0053 Starlink Group 6-58 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 90 284 x 292 x 43 0 May 14 1839 Starlink Group 8-7 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 91 284 x 296 x 53 2 May 16 2121 Kosmos-2576 Soyuz-2-1B/Fregat Plesetsk LC43/4 Imaging 92A 435 x 451 x 97 3 SITRO-AIS-53 Comms 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 SITRO-AIS-54 Comms 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 SITRO-AIS-55 Comms 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 SITRO-AIS-56 Comms 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 Zorkiy-2M No 4 Imaging 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 Zorkiy-2M No 6 Imaging 92 535 x 552 x 97 6 Rassvet-2 No 1 Comms 92 793 x 797 x 98 6 Rassvet-2 No 2 Comms 92 793 x 797 x 98 6 Rassvet-2 No 3 Comms 92 793 x 797 x 98 6 May 18 0032 Starlink Group 6-59 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 93 284 x 292 x 43 0 May 20 0306 Beijing-3C 01 Chang Zheng 2D Taiyuan Imaging 94 489 x 503 x 97 5 Beijing-3C 02 Imaging 94 Beijing-3C 03 Imaging 94 Beijing-3C 04 Imaging 94

Table of Recent Suborbital Launches

New Shepard NS-25 flew on May 19 with space travellers 688 Ken Hess, 689 Carol Schaller, 690 Sylvain Chiron, 691 Ed Dwight, 692 Gopi Thotakura, and 693 Mason Angel Liftoff was at 1435:18 UTC and flight time was 9m 44s On descent, only two of three parachutes fully inflated but touchdown was safely achieved

Date UT Payload Rocket Site Mission Apogee Target

Apr 12 1600? Yars-E RV Topol'-ME Kapustin Yar Test 1000? Sary Shagan Apr 13 2300? Warheads Emad? (many) Iran Weapon 300? Israel Apr 13 2300? Warheads Kheibar Shekan? Iran Weapon 300? Israel Apr 13 2300? Warheads Dezful? Yemen? Weapon 300? Israel Apr 13 2300? Warheads Ghadr-110? Iran Weapon 300? Israel (total 110 Iran ballistic missile launches on Apr 14?) Apr 13 2330? Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-51, E Med Interceptor 100? Intercept Iranian missiles Apr 13 2330? Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-51, E Med Interceptor 100? Intercept Iranian missiles Apr 13 2330? Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-64, E Med Interceptor 100? Intercept Iranian missiles Apr 13 2330? Aegis KV SM-3 DDG-64, E Med Interceptor 100? Intercept Iranian missiles Apr 17 2213 FOXSI-4 Black Brant 9 Poker Flat Solar X-ray 300? PFRR Alaska Apr 17 2214 Hi-C FLARE Black Brant 9 Poker Flat Solar X-ray 300? PFRR Alaska May 5 0332 CIBER-2 F3 Black Brant 9 White Sands IR Astron 300? White Sands May 19 1435 NS-25 New Shepard West Texas Tourist flight 107 West Texas

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