Jonathan's Space Report

No 658 2012 May 7 Somerville, MA USA

Space Station

Soyuz TMA-22 undocked from the Poisk module at 0818 UTC on Apr 27, with Soyuz commander Anton Shkaplerov and flight engineers Anatoliy Ivanishin and Dan Burbank The spacecraft landed in Kazakhstan at 1145 UTC

The undocking of Soyuz TMA-22 marked the start of ISS Expedition 31 The current Ex 31 crew are commander Oleg Kononenko, flight engineer 4 Andre Kuipers, and flight engineer 5 Don Pettit

ATV 3 is docked at Zvezda The Progress M-15M cargo ship was launched on Apr 20 on ISS mission 47P into a 187 x 230 km orbit, soon adjusted to 245 x 305 km x 51 6 deg Progress M-15M is spacecraft tail number 415 It docked with the Pirs module at 1439 UTC on Apr 22,

Progress M-14M completed its free flight for the Radar-Progress experiment and was deorbited over the Pacific on Apr 28

YahSat

The second Astrium Eurostar E3000 satellite for Al Yah Satellite Communications of Abu Dhabi was launched on Apr 23, aboard a Proton-M from Baykonur The satellite has a launch mass of around 6050 kg including propellant On Apr 25 the satellite was in a 3905 x 35740 km x 23 7 deg transfer orbit; by May 3 the satellite was in a 35785 x 35804 km x 0 0 deg geosynchronous orbit drifting past 47 deg E

RISAT

India's Radar Imaging Satellite (RISAT-1) was launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Center on Sriharikota Island on Apr 26 The 1858 kg RISAT-1 carries a C-band synthetic aperture radar payload mounted on an IRS-derived bus RISAT-2, launched in 2009, was a smaller Israeli-built radar payload

The PSLV-XL rocket's first stage flew eastward to a roughly -5940 x 82 km x 46 6 deg suborbital path, avoiding overflight of Sri Lanka; the second stage then flew southward toward polar orbit, with the third stage reaching perhaps -1940? x 333? km x 96 1 deg and impacting the southern Indian Ocea at 35 5S 74 5E The fourth stage entered orbit and deployed RISAT-1 to a 465 x 480 km x 97 6 deg initial orbit RISAT-1's onboard engines raised this orbit to 530 x 549 km x 97 6 deg by Apr 28, putting the satellite in a sun-synchronous orbit with 05:51 local time descending node

Beidou

A Chang Zheng (Long March) 3B was launched from Xichang with a new large fairing and dual satellite adapter, carrying two Beidou-2 satellites called 'shier ke Beidou er hao weixing' and 'shisan ke Beidou er hao weixing' (Beidou-2 satellite 12 and 13) by CALT; they are also known as COMPASS MEO 3 and MEO 4

The two satellites were inserted in 200 x 21550 km x 55 0 deg orbits and will separately use their own apogee engines to make their orbits circular Four objects with identifiers 2012-018A,B,C,D have been cataloged - the two Beidou, the CZ-3B third stage, and the intersatellite adapter On May 6, A and B were still in the transfer orbit and no new elements for C and D are available since May 1 It's possible that C and D were really the payloads and have been temporarily lost after their move to the expected circular orbit

AEHF 2

Atlas V flight AV-031 was launched from Cape Canaveral on May 4 into a 185 x 901 km x 27 5 deg parking orbit and then a 225 x 50031 km x 20 6 deg transfer orbit It deployed the 6200 kg AEHF SV-2 satellite The US Air Force Advanced EHF communications satellite provides strategic military communications at EHF frequencies and is based on the Lockheed Martin/Sunnyvale A2100 spacecraft bus with a Japanese IHI BT-4 apogee thruster and an electric propulsion system The first AEHF had a failure in its main propulsion system but was able to eventually reach orbit with its electric ion thrusters

The AV-031 Centaur stage vented its remaining propellant; an initial set of orbital data implying deorbit seems to have been incorrect Orbit on May 5 is reported to be 88 x 50406 km x 20 4 deg, with first perigee pass around 1040 UTC on May 5

Tianhui 1-02

On May 6 the satellite 'Tianhui yihao 02 xing' (Mapping-1 Sat 02) was launched from Jiuquan space center by a Chang Zheng 2D launch vehicle into a 490 x 506 km x 97 4 deg sun-synchronous orbit with a 13:30 local time descending node Its elder sibling TH 1-01 in an orbit with approximately the same local time The CZ-2D second stage was not cataloged and probably was deorbited on the first Earth revolution

TH 1-02, called Tianhui-1B by Western sources, carries visibile-band mapping cameras with 5m resolution

Deep Space

The Cassini spacecraft flew past Enceladus at 74 km on both Apr 13 and May 2 On May 1, the Dawn spacecraft began to raise its 210 km low altitude orbit around Vesta to begin its second high altitude mapping phase at around 680 km above the surface

Suborbital Flights

The Minuteman missile launched on Feb 25 was mission GT203GM, not GT206GM as I reported in JSR655, and carried a single Mk 21 reentry vehicle from Vandenberg to Kwajalein

Table of Recent (orbital) Launches

Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL
DES Mar 23 0434 Edoardo Amaldi Ariane 5ES-ATV Kourou ELA3 Cargo 10A Mar 25 1210 Intelsat IS-22 Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 11A Mar 30 0549 Kosmos-2479 Proton-K/DM-2 Baykonur LC81/24 EarlyWarn 12A Mar 31 1027 Apstar 7 Chang Zheng 3B/E Xichang LC2 Comms 13A Apr 3 2312 NROL-25 Delta 4M+(5,2) Vandenberg SLC6 Radar 14A Apr 12 2239 Kwangmyongsong-3 Unha-3 Sohae Tech F01 Apr 20 1250 Progress M-15M Soyuz-U Baykonur LC31/6 Cargo 15A Apr 23 2218 Yahsat-1B Proton-M/Briz-M Baykonur LC200/39 Comms 16A Apr 26 0017 RISAT-1 PSLV-XL Sriharikota Radar 17A Apr 29 2050 Beidou DW 12 ) Chang Zheng 3B Xichang LC2 Nav 18A Beidou DW 13 ) Nav 18B May 4 1842 AEHF 2 Atlas V 531 Canaveral SLC41 Comms 19A May 6 0710 Tianhui 1-02 Chang Zheng 2D Jiuquan SLS2 Imaging 20A

Table of Recent (suborbital) Launches

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

Mar 19 1405 REXUS 12 Imp Orion ESRANGE Micrograv 82 Mar 22 0900 NASA 36 277UG Black Brant IX White Sands IR Astron 320? Mar 27 0858 NASA 45 004UE Terrier Oriole Wallops Atm Sci 375? Mar 27 0859 NASA 46 002UE Terrier Malemute Wallops Atm Sci 200? Mar 27 0900 NASA 41 097UE Terrier Orion Wallops Atm Sci 157? Mar 27 0902 NASA 46 003UE Terrier Malemute Wallops Atm Sci 254? Mar 27 0903 NASA 41 098UE Terrier Orion Wallops Atm Sci 169? Mar 29 Target Unknown White Sands? Target 80? Apr 5 1418 SL-6 SpaceLoft XL Spaceport America Tech 117 Apr 19 0237 Agni RV Agni V Chandipur R&D 800 Apr 25 Shaheen RV Shaheen 1A Somniani? R&D 100?

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