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Aviation History
2002
2002 - 0342.PDF
SPACEFLIGHT SUBSIDIES TIM FURNISS / LONDON USAF may have to fund launch vehicles Slump in commercial market could mean Boeing and Lockheed Martin having to seek government assurances The US Air Force may have to sub sidise Boeing and Lockheed Martin to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars to ensure the new Delta IV and Atlas V Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELVs) will be available for government missions. The funding could be necessary due to the reduction in the com mercial satellite launch market. The Delta IV and Atlas V have fewer than 12 civil commercial satellite launches booked between them. Industry sources suggest that the current dearth in orders may result in Boeing and Lockheed Martin reducing their respective $1.5 million and $750 million investment in the programmes. The USAF awarded both the companies EELV contracts in 1998, with Boeing netting $1.3 billion of launch business and Lockheed Martin $650 million. Boeing was awarded 19 USAF launches, which was increased to 21 in 2000 by two launches that were originally part of Lockheed Martin's nine. Some early USAF launch con tracts for the Delta IV could be transferred to the Atlas V to com pensate for the imbalance, with further procurements to be made on a more even bias. The maiden flights of both vehicles are set for this year, but it will take several missions before the boosters are fully operational. The manufacturers do not expect the programmes to be profitable until 2010. • The two stages of the first Boeing Delta IV booster have been mated in the launcher-processing build ing at Cape Canaveral's refurbished Launch Complex 37. Two solid rocket motors will be added to the Delta IV Medium booster on the pad in preparation for a mid-July launch - a delay from the target date of May. BUDGETS ISS is inefficient and wasteful' The International Space Station (ISS) has come under fire again, this time from the US government's Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The ISS is one of the government's "most inefficient and wasteful programmes", says Mitch Daniels, director of the OMB. Despite its promise as a research platform, the ISS will be highlighted in the Bush Administration's 2003 budget programme as an example of one of the "biggest overruns ever in the federal government", says Daniels, calling for the introduction of "firm accountability". Daniels' for mer deputy is Sean O'Keefe, recently appointed NASA administrator. Meanwhile, former NASA manned spaceflight chief Chris Kraft has expressed concern that O'Keefe lacks the knowledge of "what NASA is", and is critical of the new chief's statement that the agency ignores costs and worries only about technical and safety matters. In an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers publication, Kraft questions whether O'Keefe would be willing to sign off more risk-taking changes to the ISS that would save money. He suggests, for example, that the risk of needing to evacuate the ISS quickly is small enough to negate the need for a Crew Return Vehicle. He also suggests that instead of spending $4 billion on the Space Launch Initiative, NASA should put the money into upgrading the Space Shuttle. • The second ISS Expedition Crew 4 spacewalk was made on 25 January. The 6h spacewalk involved the installation of protective covers around thrusters on the Russian Zvezda module, additional amateur radio antennas, new tether connections for future EVAs and some science experiments. A third and final EVA will be made this month to pre-position equipment that will be used by the crew of Shuttle mission STS 110, which will be launched in April to install the S Zero truss. LAUNCHERS Arianespace performs first mission of the year Arianespace completed its first launch of 2002 with the flight from Kourou of an Ariane 42L booster in late January carrying India's 2,750kg (6,1001b) Insat 3C communications satellite. Flight F147 was launched after the ignition sequence was ini tially aborted. The next mission, VI48, is due on 20 February, with an Ariane 44L carrying Intelsat 904. Arianespace says the Ariane 5's return to flight is also on schedule carrying the European Space Agency's Envisat polar platform in late February. Ariane 5 has been grounded since July when it failed to put two satel lites into the correct orbit. Meanwhile, the Boeing-led Sea Launch venture plans to make five commercial launches this year from the Odyssey platform in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, with the first due for the second quarter. The company says it has 17 launch orders and plans to make six to seven launches next year. The first Lockheed Martin Atlas IIIB booster with a dual-engine Centaur stage will be launched by International Launch Services from Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral on 21 February, carrying the EchoStar VII communications satellite. The Atlas IIIB can carry 4,500kg to geo stationary transfer orbit. The launch will be only the second by an Atlas III. • The launch of a US Air Force Defense Meteorological Space Prog ram satellite by a Titan 11 booster has been delayed to 13 February at the earliest due to a vacuum leak on a valve during propellant load ing. The troubled launch was origi nally set for late 2000. IMAGING 3D maps to be kept under wraps NASA has released high-definition three-dimensional (3D) colour-shaded relief elevation maps of California derived from coverage by the February 2000 Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (STRM). This image of San Diego was also produced using ground colour data from the Landsat 7 spacecraft. NASA plans to model 80% of the Earth's surface using STRM coverage to provide a 3D map of the planet in unprecedented detail. NASA had planned to make this data available worldwide, but the US Department of Defense is concerned that users could apply it for military planning, while the State Department is worried over the issue of the "pri vacy" of nations. Only detailed maps of the USA will now be released. 26 5-11 FEBRUARY 2002 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL www.flightinternational.com
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