All Space articles – Page 213
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Weight saver
A new Space Shuttle external tank (ET) will be used for the first time in December 1997, fitted to the STS88/ Endeavour, the first assembly mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The tank will be 3,400kg lighter than the original ET, adding an equivalent weight to the amount of ...
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'Abrupt failure' results in loss of second Telstar 4 satellite
AT&T Skynet says that its Telstar 401 satellite experienced an abrupt failure of its telemetry and communications on 11 January. It is the second in-flight loss of this spacecraft series. The company restored services to only those 401customers whose contracts called for transfer of their transponder services, to ...
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OSC contracts to launch Kompsat
The contract between Korea Aerospace and Orbital Sciences (OSC) to launch in 1999 the TRW-built Kompsat multipurpose satellite aboard a Taurus booster from Vandenberg AFB, California, has been formally signed. The Taurus has been flown just once (in 1994), but OSC has two firm contracts for launches on ...
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NASA plans interim module for Space Station
NASA IS TO build its own Interim Control Module in an attempt to reduce the effect of the delay in the production of the Russian Service Module for the International Space Station (ISS) (Flight International, 18-31 December, 1996). The Service Module, the third major component of the ISS, ...
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Message to Saturn
The European Space Agency (ESA) is inviting members of the European public to write and sign short personal messages for a CD-ROM to be fitted to the Huygens probe scheduled to be flown towards the planet Saturn in October and land on the ringed-planet's moon, Titan, in 2002. ...
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Russia details 1997 launch programme
Funding permitting, Russia plans to launch 28 boosters in 1997, carrying a variety of satellites into orbit. These will include three manned Soyuz TM and four unmanned Progress M tankers to the Mir 1 space station. At least three commercial Proton launches are scheduled, starting with the flight ...
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Arianespace 'record' boosted by Ariane 4
Arianespace is claiming an "absolute record" for launch operations during 1996, despite the loss of the first of the European Space Agency's (ESA) new Ariane 5 heavy launchers on a mid-year maiden flight. The Ariane 4 operation involved an unbroken string of ten successful launches, placing 15 satellites ...
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Mercury could be target for fifth Discovery
NASA will make a final decision in April whether to launch the Hermes Global Orbiter spacecraft to map the planet Mercury as the fifth mission in the Discovery series. The Hermes has been proposed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), California and spacecraft-builder Spectrum Astro in Arizona. The ...
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EELV engine passes key test
Full-scale propellant injector and thrust-chamber tests of the first-stage engine of the McDonnell Douglas (MDC) Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) candidate vehicle have been completed at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Alabama, marking a major milestone in the programme. The 2,850kN (640,500lb)-thrust RS-68 liquid-oxygen/liquid-hydrogen (LOX/LH) cryogenic main engine ...
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Joint endeavours
Col Ben Robinson, commander of the USAir Force's 93rd Air Expeditionary Group (Provisional) says: "We shoot no missiles; we carry no cargo; our only product is information; and information dominance is the key to success." The system which brings so much to the modern battlefield without firing a shot is ...
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Icy irony
NASA's Lunar Prospector spacecraft, to be launched in October, has been given a "real" mission, thanks to the military. The plan for the Prospector to be used to map the chemical composition of the Moon has been made all the more tantalising by the apparent discovery of an "ice lake" ...
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Engine plant
Construction has begun of a new Space Shuttle Main Engine Processing building next to the Orbiter Processing building at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The engine-processing building is scheduled to be opened in July 1998. Source: Flight International
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Russian programme in crisis
Russia may have to abandon its manned space programme this year because of a severe shortage of funds, Yuri Koptev, director-general of the Russian Space Agency has warned the Government. It has been planned that the country's Mir 1 space station will be the base for several international ...
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Japan plans its first space-docking experiment
Japan will become the third space nation, after the USA and Russia, to conduct a rendezvous and docking in space. The Engineering Test Satellite, ETS7, to be launched with the US/Japanese Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite by a national H2 booster in the middle of 1997, will consist ...
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TTS unveils new-design simulator
THOMSON TRAINING &Simulation (TTS) has delivered the first of its new-design full-flight simulators to the ATR Training Centre (ATC) in Toulouse, France. The new design was evolved following TTS' acquisition of Rediffusion and includes features from the UK company's Concept 90 simulator. The first new-design machine to enter ...
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Rising star
Despite annual sales of around $20 million and a rating as one of the fastest-growing space companies in the USA, Spectrum Astro's success had gone relatively unnoticed until NASA awarded it the contract to develop the first craft in the space agency's New Millennium programme. Spectrum Astro, of ...
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Indonesian orders boost Space Systems/Loral
Indonesia's PT Pasifik Satelit Nusantara, of Jakarta has ordered one M2A satellite from Space Systems/Loral for its Multi Media Satellite System, plus long-lead parts for a second craft, and options for a further five satellites in a deal worth $350 million (Flight International, 2-8 October, 1996). Loral will ...
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Inmarsat launch
An ILS International Launch Services Atlas 2A booster lofted the Lockheed Martin Astro Space/Matra Marconi Space-built Inmarsat 3F3 mobile communications satellite into geostationary-transfer orbit from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 17 December. The new satellite will serve the Pacific Ocean region, complementing the first two satellites over the Indian and Atlantic ...
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Columbia returns with new record
The Space Shuttle Columbia's extended STS80 mission was completed with a landing at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 7 December. The mission duration of 17 days 15h was a new Shuttle record. The prime objectives of the mission were completed successfully. These were to deploy and retrieve ...