Jonathan's Space Report

No 795 2021 Jul 22 Somerville, MA

International Space Station

Expedition 65 continues

On Jun 30 the Canadarm-2 removed the IROSA FSE carrier from the POA (Payload ORU Accomodation) storage point on the ISS truss Mobile Base System and stowed it in the trunk of Dragon CRS-22, wrapping up the operations to install the 2B and 4B IROSA solar arrays

Cygnus NG-15, in free flight after departing ISS, released three cubesats from its SEOPS LLC Slingshot deployer on Jun 30 Two of the satellites are thought to be ORCA-7 and Gunsmoke-J 3 NG-15 was deorbited over the Pacific at about 0130 UTC Jul 2

According to reporting by Novosti, the BD-28 satellite deployed from ISS on Jun 22 is actually G-SATELLITE 2 The satellite is owned by OneTeam, a collaboration of Tokyo U's Nakasuka Funase Lab and various companies G-SATELLITE 1 was deployed in similar secrecy in Apr 2020 That satellite's mission was advertising, to promote the Tokyo Olympics It contained mechanisms to deploy to the exterior (but remaining attached) a display with figurines of robot characters from the 'Mobile Suit Gundam' anime television series, and a camera to image them against the Earth in the background I assume G-SATELLITE 2 is a duplicate of the first one

On Jul 8 at 1445 UTC the Dragon CRS-22 cargo ship undocked from the IDA-3 docking port to begin its return to Earth Around 1800 UTC Jul 8 the ship lowered its orbit to 203 x 319 km On Jul 10, after jettisoning the trunk (containing the IROSA FSE) CRS-22 fired its engines at about 0245 UTC for a 9 minute deorbit burn, and splashed down at 0329 UTC in the Gulf of Mexico near 84 3W 29 2N

On Jul 21 at 1045 UTC astronauts Kimbrough, McArthur, Hoshide and Pesquet undocked from IDA-2 in Dragon Endeavour and flew around ISS to redock at IDA-3 at 1135 UTC This leaves IDA-2 free for the planned Starliner docking

On Jul 21 at 1458 UTC Roskosmos launched a Proton-M from Baykonur carrying the 20-tonne MLM-U Nauka module to orbit Nauka is scheduled to dock with the ISS Zvezda nadir port Attached to the 19627 kg Nauka is the European Robotic Arm, ERA, a 630 kg, 11 4m long robot arm Two parts of Nauka, the ShK airlock and the module radiator, are already at ISS - they have been sitting dormant attached to the Rassvet module for the past eleven years On the first day in orbit, a number of Nauka's systems malfunctioned, including its main engines, and flight controllers were working to resolve the issues

Blue Origin NS-16

On Jul 20 Blue Origin launched the New Shepard PM4/CC2 0-2 stack on its third flight from the West Texas launch site Mission NS-16 carried Jeff Bezos, Mark Bezos, Wally Funk and Oliver Daemen aboard the crew capsule CC2 0-2 (RSS First Step) The flight reached a 107 km apogee; the booster PM4 landed back at the launch site and the capsule separated and landed on parachutes

Virgin Galactic Unity-22

Virgin Galactic carried out another test flight of Spaceship Two into space on Jul 11, with six Virgin Galactic employees on board: Chief Pilot David Mackay, Pilot Mike Masucci, and 'Astronaut 001' to 'Astronaut 004' Richard Branson, Beth Moses, Colin Bennett and Sirisha Bandla

The Unity 22 mission took off from Spaceport America at 1443 UTC The carrier plane VMS Eve, flying at 14 1 km altitude, dropped the VSS Unity spaceplane at 1525 UTC over 107 0W 33 2N Two seconds later Unity fired its hybrid rocket engine for a 60 second burn with a cutoff velocity of 0 98 km/s Unity reached space at D+2:02 (2 min 2s after drop); at D+2:39 it reached an apogee of 86 2 km above sea level It dropped below 80 km at D+3:14 and glided to landing back at Spaceport America at D+14:19 (touchdown), with wheels stop at D+15:14 The exact drop time to the second is not yet available

Virgin Orbit

Virgin Orbit's third orbital attempt, with LauncherOne S/N R4, was carried out on Jun 30 The Boeing 747 'Cosmic Girl' took off from Mojave at 1353 UTC and flew to 120 1W 33 2N where it dropped the LauncherOne at 1447 UTC The first stage ignited a few seconds later The two-stage rocket reached transfer orbit at 1455 UTC and then made an orbit circularization burn at 1525 UTC Payload deployment began at 1527 UTC

The payloads were: CNCE Block 1 (two 3U satellites) for the Missile Defense Agency's Cubesat Networked Communications Experiment - the two cubesats will mimic two suborbital interceptor kill vehicles and test communications between them Control from MDA/Schriever in Colorado Springs; unclear who built the satellites

Gunsmoke-J, a 3U communications test satellite for the US Army Space and Missile Defence Center, built by TriSept Corp Two other Gunsmoke-J satellites were launched on Electron 19 and Cygnus NG-15

Halo-NET Free Flyer, a 3U test of a laser retroreflector array for the US Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Center's laser communications program An earlier Halo-NET payload flew attached to STPSAT-5 in 2018

Brik-II, a 6U test satellite for the Royal Netherlands Air Force

STORK 4 and STORK 5, 3U imaging satellites for SatRevolution of Poland

Transporter-2

SpaceX launched the Transporter-2 rideshare mission and three Starlink satellites on Jun 30 The main payload was a stack of 4 ESPA rings from which satellites were ejected The three Starlink satellites were on a truss structure at the top of the stack and ejected last It is not yet clear if the usual four tension rods were also released Three of the ejected payloads - Sherpa-FX2, Sherpa-LTE1 and ION-SVC-003 - were `tugs' that carried satellite stacks of their own The Sherpa subsatellites were released within a few hours of launch Two NASA satellites were released from a Mandrake dispenser attached to the aft end of the second stage The second stage was deorbited over the Indian Ocean at about 2130 UTC, with the ESPA stack still attached (On Transporter 1, the Starlinks were between the ESPA stack and the second stage, so the ESPA stack had to be itself ejected and remains in orbit as debris )

ION-SVC-003 'Dauntless David' began dispensing its payloads on Jul 16, including the first Kuwaiti satellite QMR-KWT

OneWeb

36 more OneWeb satellites were launched by Soyuz from Vostochniy on Jul 1

CZ-2D

SAST (Shanghai) launched a CZ-2D from Taiyuan on Jul 3 with five imaging satellites The Jilin-1 series of commercial Earth imaging satellites is operated by the Changguang Sat Tech Ltd in Changchun, Jilin province The Jilin-1 Kuanfu (wide) series has a large field of view while the Jilin-1 Gaofen (hi-res) series has narrow hi-res imagers Xingshidai-10 (also called Guangdong Hengjian) is a small imaging satellite from Guoxing Yuhang Keji YG (ADA Space)

Jilin-1 Kuanfu 01B is also called Neimenggu 1 (Inner Mongolia 1)

Tianhe

Chinese astronauts Liu and Tang made the first spacewalk from the new Chinese station on Jul 4 The hatch was opened at 0011 UTC and closed at 0657 UTC They installed foot restraints on the robot arm and tested moving Liu on the arm, and deployed an exterior camera

CZ-4C

SAST (Shanghai) launched a CZ-4C from Jiuquan on Jul 4 with the Fengyun 3E polar weather satellite The satellite entered a sun-sync orbit with 0541 local time descending node

CZ-3C

CALT (Beijing) launched a CZ-3C from Xichang on Jul 6 with the TianLian 1-05 data relay satellite

CZ-6

SAST launched a CZ-6 from Taiyuan on Jul 9 with five radio-spectrum monitoring satellites for the Ningxia company, designated Zhongzi Constellation Group 2

CZ-2C

CALT launched a CZ-2C from Xichang on Jul 19 with the tenth triplet of Yaogan-30 satellites, thought to be for signals intelligence The Tianqi-15 commercial communications satellite was carried as a secondary payload

Table of Recent Orbital Launches

Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL Catalog Perigee Apogee Incl Notes Jun 18 0630 Yaogan 30 hao 09 zu 01 xing) Chang Zheng 2C Xichang Sigint? 55A S48860 590 x 603 x 35 0 Yaogan 30 hao 09 zu 02 xing) Sigint? 55B S48861 591 x 602 x 35 0 Yaogan 30 hao 09 zu 03 xing) Sigint? 55D S48863 592 x 602 x 35 0 Tianqi 14 ) Comms 55E S48864 571 x 681 x 35 1 Jun 22 1055 MIR-SAT1 ISS, LEO Tech 9867SP S48868 416 x 420 x 51 6 Jun 22 1200? G-SATELLITE 2 ISS, LEO Tech 9867SN S48867 415 x 419 x 51 6 Jun 23? Test satellite? Simorgh? Khomeini Test? F03 Jun 25 1950 Kosmos-2550 Soyuz-2-1b Plesetsk LC43/4 Sigint 56A S48865 195 x 466 x 67 1 Jun 29 2250 IT-SPINS ) Cygnus NG-15, LEO Sci 13G S49017 489 x 503 x 51 6 MySat-2 ) Tech 13F S49016 489 x 503 x 51 6 Jun 29 2327 Progress MS-17 Soyuz-2-1a Baykonur LC31 Cargo 57A S48869 280 x 383 x 51 7 Jun 30 1447 CNCE 1 ) Launcher One B747, Mojave Com 58E S48875 495 x 520 x 60 7 CNCE 3 ) Com 58D S48874 495 x 520 x 60 7 Gunsmoke-J 4 ) Com 58H S48878 495 x 526 x 60 7 HALO-Net FF ) Tech 58G S48877 495 x 522 x 60 7 Brik-II ) Tech/Com 58F S48876 495 x 522 x 60 7 STORK 4 ) Imaging 58C S48873 495 x 526 x 60 7 STORK 5 ) Imaging 58B S48872 495 x 522 x 60 7 Jun 30 1931 Transporter-2 ) Falcon 9 Canaveral SLC40 Dispenser 59 530 x 545 x 97 5 Starlink 3003 ) Comms 59A S48879 515 x 536 x 97 5 Starlink 3004 ) Comms 59B S48880 515 x 536 x 97 5 Starlink 3005 ) Comms 59C S48881 510 x 525 x 97 5 SHERPA-LTE-1 ) Dispenser 59BQ S48941 524 x 536 x 97 5 SHERPA-FX-2 ) Dispenser 59 ION-SVC-003 ) Dispenser 59AK S48912 520 x 537 x 97 5 YAM-2 ) Tech 59 YAM-3 ) Tech 59AN S48915 519 x 537 x 97 5 Nusat-19 (Rosalind) ) Imaging 59AC S48905 521 x 537 x 97 5 Nusat-20 (Grace) ) Imaging 59AU S48921 521 x 537 x 97 5 Nusat-21 (Elisa) ) Imaging 59AT S48920 521 x 537 x 97 5 Nusat-22 (Sofya) ) Imaging 59AS S48919 521 x 537 x 97 5 Umbra-SAR 2001 ) Radar 59AD S48906 521 x 537 x 97 5 ICEYE-X11 ) Radar 59AR S48918 519 x 537 x 97 5 ICEYE-X12 ) Radar 59AM S48914 519 x 537 x 97 5 ICEYE-X13 ) Radar 59AP S48916 519 x 537 x 97 5 ICEYE-X15 ) Radar 59AQ S48917 519 x 537 x 97 5 Capella 5 ) Radar 59AL S48913 520 x 536 x 97 5 TUBIN ) Tech 59X S48900 523 x 537 x 97 5 Lemur-2-Jackson ) Com/Met 59G S48885 524 x 537 x 97 5 Lemur-2-AnnaBanana ) Com/Met 59AW S48923 524 x 537 x 97 5 D2/AtlaCom-1 ) Tech 59 PACE-1 ) Tech 59 TROPICS Pathfinder ) Sci 59Y S48901 522 x 537 x 97 5 Mandrake 2A ) Com 59AE S48907 521 x 537 x 97 5 Mandrake 2B ) Com 59AF S48908 521 x 537 x 97 5 LINCS 1 ) Com 59 LINCS 2 ) Com 59 Centauri 4 ) Com 59V S48898 522 x 538 x 97 5 GNOMES 2 ) Com 59 EG-3 ) Com 59P S48892 642 x 655 x 97 5 SpaceBEENZ-7 ) Com 59L S48889 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEENZ-8 ) Com 59N S48891 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEENZ-9 ) Com 59J S48887 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEENZ-10 ) Com 59D S48882 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-88 ) Com 59BJ S48935 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-89 ) Com 59BG S48933 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-90 ) Com 59BW S48947 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-91 ) Com 59BP S48940 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-92 ) Com 59BF S48932 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-93 ) Com 59BN S48939 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-94 ) Com 59BL S48937 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-95 ) Com 59BU S48945 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-96 ) Com 59BH S48934 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-97 ) Com 59BK S48936 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-98 ) Com 59BY S48949 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-99 ) Com 59BV S48946 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-100 ) Com 59E S48883 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-101 ) Com 59F S48884 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-102 ) Com 59H S48886 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-103 ) Com 59K S48888 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-104 ) Com 59M S48890 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-105 ) Com 59T S48896 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-106 ) Com 59Q S48893 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-107 ) Com 59R S48894 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-108 ) Com 59S S48895 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-109 ) Com 59U S48897 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-110 ) Com 59W S48899 525 x 536 x 97 5 SpaceBEE-111 ) Com 59AB S48904 521 x 536 x 97 5 Jun 30 2300? Astrocast-0201 ) Sherpa-FX2, LEO Com 59CD S48954 512 x 533 x 97 5 Astrocast-0202 ) Com 59CL S48961 512 x 533 x 97 5 Astrocast-0203 ) Com 59CE S48955 512 x 533 x 97 5 Astrocast-0204 ) Com 59 Astrocast-0205 ) Com 59CK S48960 512 x 533 x 97 5 Hawk 3A ) Sigint 59CG S48957 513 x 536 x 97 5 Hawk 3B ) Sigint 59BE S48931 513 x 536 x 97 5 Hawk 3C ) Sigint 59BX S48948 513 x 536 x 97 5 Lynk 06 (Shannon) ) Com 59BM S48938 513 x 536 x 97 5 Painani-2 ) Tech 59 Lemur-2-John-Treires ) Com/Met 59AY S48925 524 x 537 x 97 5 Lemur-2-AC-Cubed ) Com/Met 59BA S48927 524 x 537 x 97 5 Lemur-2-Merima ) Com/Met 59BC S48929 524 x 537 x 97 5 Jun 30 2300? Aurora/Shasta ) Sherpa-LTE1, LEO Sigint 59 Polar Vigilance 1 ) Sigint 59
Polar Vigilance 2 ) Sigint 59
Polar Vigilance 3 ) Sigint 59
Polar Vigilance 4 ) Sigint 59
Faraday Phoenix ) Tech 59
Lemur-2-CarlSantaMari ) Com/Met 59CJ S48959 524 x 537 x 97 5 Tiger-2 ) Tech 59
ARTHUR-1 ) Tech 59CC S48953 513 x 534 x 97 5 Tenzing ) Tech 59
Jun 30 1500 ORCA-7 Cygnus NG-15,LEO Tech? 13C S49013 492 x 501 x 51 6 Jun 30 1630 UNKNOWN SAT Cygnus NG-15,LEO Com 13E? S49015 487 x 503 x 51 6 Jun 30 1830 Gunsmoke-J 2 Cygnus NG-15, LEO Com 13D S49014 487 x 503 x 51 6 Jul 1 1238 OneWeb SL0249-SL0284 ) Soyuz/Fregat Vostochniy PU1 Com 60A-AM 443 x 454 x 87 4 Jul 3 0251 Jilin-1 KF01B ) Chang Zheng 2D Taiyuan Imaging 61A S49003 531 x 545 x 97 5 Jilin-1 GF03D-01) Imaging 61 S49004 530 x 543 x 97 5 Jilin-1 GF03D-02) Imaging 61 S49005 526 x 543 x 97 5 Jilin-1 GF03D-03) Imaging 61 S49006 525 x 543 x 97 5 Xingshidai 10 ) Imaging 61 S49007 525 x 543 x 97 5 Jul 4 2328 Fengyun-3 05 Chang Zheng 4C Jiuquan Meteo 62A S49008 792 x 815 x 98 7 Jul 6 1553 TianLian 1-05 Chang Zheng 3C Xichang Comms 63A S49010 180 x 39784 x 17 6 Jul 9 1159 Zhongzi 2-01 ) Chang Zheng 6 Taiyuan Sigint 64A S49018 857 x 867 x 45 0 Zhongzi 2-02 ) Sigint 64B S49019 857 x 867 x 45 0 Zhongzi 2-03 ) Sigint 64C S49020 857 x 867 x 45 0 Zhongzi 2-04 ) Sigint 64D S49021 857 x 867 x 45 0 Zhongzi 2-05 ) Sigint 64E S49022 857 x 867 x 45 0 Jul 16 QMR-KWT) ION-SVC03, LEO Tech 59 Ghalib ) Tech 59 Jul 18 NAPA-2 ION-SVC03, LEO Img 59 Jul 19 0019 Yaogan 30 hao 10 zu 01 xing ) Chang Zheng 2C Xichang Sigint 65A? S49026 588 x 599 x 35 0 Yaogan 30 hao 10 zu 02 xing ) Sigint 65B? S49027 588 x 599 x 35 0 Yaogan 30 hao 10 zu 03 xing ) Sigint 65C? S49028 588 x 599 x 35 0 Tianqi 15 ) Com 65D? S49029 591 x 602 x 35 0 Jul 21 1458 Nauka Proton-M Baykonur LC39/200 Module 66A S49044 190 x 346 x 51 6

Table of Recent Suborbital Launches

China's CALT launched a test of a suborbital reusable spaceplane from Jiuquan on Jul 16 It flew across the Badain Jaran desret and landed on the runway at Alashan Youqi It was described as Ya (sub) guidao (orbital) chongfu shiyong (reusable) yanshi (demo) yanzheng (verification/test) xiangmu (project) yunzai (carrier) qi (vehicle) Neither apogee reached nor details of the vehicle are available

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

Jun 23 0050 DLR BOLT-1 VS-31/Orion Kiruna Hypersonic 280? ESRANGE Jun 25 1232 RockOn Terrier/Imp Orion Wallops Island Education 116 Atlantic Jun 28 0525 Agni P RV Agni P Kalam Island Test 800? Indian O Jul 3 0845 MOMO F7 MOMO Hokkaido Test 99 Pacific Jul 7 1800 Dynamo 2A Black Brant 9 Wallops I Ionosphere 123 Atlantic Jul 11 1525 Unity 22 Spaceship Two Spaceport America Test 86 Spaceport America Jul 11 1756 Dynamo 2B Black Brant 9 Wallops I Ionosphere 133 Atlantic Jul 16 YG Chongfu Shiyong YGCS Jiuquan Test 200? Alashan Youqi Jul 20 1311 RSS First Step New Shepard West Texas Tourism 107 West Texas

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