#OTD in '82 – Hexagon 17, Mission #1217 launched from @30thSpaceWing, operating for 208 days, surpassing the previous record of 161 days. pic.twitter.com/AenVjVo11k— NRO (@NatReconOfc) May 11, 2017 35 years ago today, the 17th KH-9 Big Bird reconnaissance satellite was launched atop a Titan IIID rocket from Pad 4E, Vandenberg AFB. Lasting 208 days, it was the longest-lasting U.S. reconnaissance satellite to that point.
42 years ago today, Soyuz 18 was launched atop a Soyuz-U rocket from Site 1/5, Baikonur Cosmodrome. The crew of Pyotr Klimuk and Vitali Sevastyanov would spend three months aboard Salyut 4 as its second successful crew. In addition to equipment swap-outs in the space station, the crew would conduct medical, biological, and agriculture experiments. They would make contact with the crews of Apollo-Soyuz that July. As the mission wore on, mold began to grow in the space station as the environmental control system degraded. The crew would land on July 26, about 100 miles west of present-day Astana.
Juno is indeed lifting the veil of Jupiter. And what it is finding at the poles is cray-cray. This image of Jupiter's South Pole was taken this past February. The South Pole appears to be a chaotic maelstrom of Earth-sized cyclones constantly doing battle with one another. It is nothing like the relatively orderly polar hexagon on Saturn.
India launched its latest rocket, the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) Mark III, on its first orbital flight today carrying GSAT-19. While the rocket itself is 5.7 metres shorter than GSLV Mark II, the core stage is 1.2 metres wider. Mark III has 60% more payload capacity to GTO than Mark II, at 4,000 kg. The original GSLV's were odd in that the core stage was solid-fueled, while it had four strap-on boosters powered by hypergolic fuels. Mark III switches that around, having two strap-on solid rocket boosters on a hypergolic core stage. Its upper stage is fueled by liquid hydrogen. Although this launch was a success, Mark III is not scheduled to be used again until March 2018. Meanwhile, Mark II has seven potential launches through 2020, and may be launched up to three more times this year.
NASA announced the twelve candidates of Astronaut Group 22 today. From left to right, they are Zena Cardman, Maj. Jasmin Moghbeli, Dr. Jonny Kim, Maj. Frank Rubio, LtCmdr. Matthew Dominick, Dr. Warren Hoburg, Dr. Robb Kulin, Lt. Kayla Barron, Bob Hines, LtCol. Raji Chari, Loral O'Hara, and Dr. Jessica Watkins. Five are active duty military (2 Navy, 1 Marines, 1 Army, 1 Air Force). Hines is former military and a current NASA research pilot. Six, including Maj. Rubio and Lt. Barron, are doctorates, with Cardman working on hers as well. Of note is Dr. Kulin, who is currently a Launch Engineer at SpaceX. Naturally, this includes the first NASA astronaut candidates born in the 1980s. Watkins is the youngest, having just turned 29. ******** Speaking of SpaceX, apparently the Air Force was won over by their NROL launch last month. They have awarded SpaceX the contract to conduct their next X-37B spaceplane launch. The launch is tentatively scheduled to take place in August 2017 atop a Falcon 9 FT rocket from Pad 39A, Kennedy Space Center. UPDATE: They have pinned down a more exact tentative launch date of August 15.
27 years ago today, INSAT-1D was launched atop a Delta 4925 rocket from Pad 17B, Cape Canaveral. The last of India's experimental INSAT-1 comsat series, it was also demonstrably the most successful satellite of the series, lasting for 12 years in orbit on a planned life expectancy of 7 years. All three of its predecessors had issues of some sort, with INSAT-1B the only other one to last more than two years (it lasted 10). The launch was the second of two using the Delta 4000 configuration, which exhausted McDonnell Douglas' last sets of MB-3 main engines from the 1000 series.
In July, the Minotaur rocket is finally coming to Florida. A Minotaur IV rocket is scheduled to launch from Spaceport Florida's Pad 46, former site of the similar Athena rocket, on July 15. It will carry a surveillance satellite for the military's ORS Office. The ICBM it was based upon, the LGM-118 Peacekeeper, was never tested out of Cape Canaveral. However, tests for the LGM-30 Minuteman, on which the Minotaur I was based, were conducted there. Spaceport Florida is the commercialized portion of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. It currently runs Pads 36 and 46. Pad 36 is leased to Blue Origin for the New Glenn orbital rocket. Pad 46 will be used after this launch by Vector Space Systems for the small-scale Vector-R rocket.
Doing a little more catchup. This past February, the IAU accepted NASA's submissions to fully codify naming of geological features on Pluto and its satellites. In addition to things I noted earlier, they codified that the names of explorers, both real and fictional, as well as space probes can be used as names of features on Pluto. The final step is to get the current provisional names accepted by the IAU. As an aside, Sputnik Planum has been reclassified as Sputnik Planitia. The distinction is that a planum is a high plain, like a plateau, while a planitia is a low plain.
*lugs in a giant Shop Vac and sucks up all the dust on the thread* 12 years ago today, JAXA launched ASTRO-E2 atop an M-V rocket from Uchinoura Space Center. The launch was a follow-on to ASTRO-E, which failed to launch in 2000, being the only launch failure for the M-V solid-fueled rocket. It was an X-ray telescope originally collaborated on between ISAS and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. It was given the name Suzaku once it reached orbit. The probe suffered a coolant leak, resulting in its primary instrument becoming unusable. Some of its X-ray instruments were unaffected, and it would continue to operate for about 10 years before failing.
43 years ago today, Timation 3, the third of a series of time-reference satellites developed by the Naval Research Laboratory, was launched atop an Atlas E/F rocket from Pad 3W, Vandenberg AFB. Timation 3 also featured navigational technology simulators, and was later re-classified NTS-1. The Timation series is one of the cornerstones of the Global Positioning System. Launched into an 8,500-mile slightly retrograde orbit, the probe lasted five years. By the time it was done, Navstar 1, the first official GPS satellite, was already in orbit.
40 years ago today, the Soviet Union launched Kosmos 929 atop a Proton-K rocket from Site 81/24, Baikonur Kosmodrome. Kosmos 929 was the first complete TKS spacecraft module. It carried a recovery module which could carry up to three cosmonauts, and the Functional Cargo Block (FGB). It was designed to resupply Almaz military space stations. Kosmos 929 is believed to have worked well. Its unmanned recovery module was released, and landed on August 16. The FGB re-entered in February 1978 after six months of on-orbit testing. Three other TKS modules would be launched, none manned, but they all would dock with space stations. Kosmos 1267 docked with the unmanned Salyut 6, and was used to assist in its disposal. Kosmos 1443 spent a month docked with Salyut 7 in 1983 while it was unmanned. Kosmos 1686 docked with Salyut 7 in 1985, and was used by Expedition 4, as well as the crew of Soyuz T-15. It would remain docked with Salyut 7, but ran out of fuel before it could be disposed of. You already know how that story ends. TKS would ultimately become the base design used for all the expansion module of Mir, as well as the International Space Station's Zarya and Nauka modules.
45 years ago today, the Earth Resources Technology Satellite was launched atop a Delta 0900 rocket from Pad 2W, Vandenberg AFB. In 1975, the probe would be renamed Landsat 1. Landsat 1 was the first large-scale remote sensing satellite aimed back at Earth. It carried various cameras and sensors, and collected data using two on-board tape recorders. That way it could continue to collect data while transmitting data already collected. The satellite took 100,000 images over its first year and a half of services, and over 300,000 images over the course of its five-and-a-half-year life. It was retired in early 1978 when its tape recorders malfunctioned. It was launched by the first Delta rocket to use nine solid-rocket motors. It was the first to use the modern Delta rocket designation system, though it used the regular Long-Tank Thor first stage instead of the Extended Long-Tank Thor that the designation system was created for. Hence, its first number being a zero. One of the most unique discoveries of the mission was the discovery of an island 20 km off the northeast tip of the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. To this day, the island has not been extensively studied, though it is known to be frequently visited by polar bears. The island was claimed by Canada, and named Landsat Island.
57 years ago today, NASA announced that their advanced manned spaceflight program, which would succeed Project Mercury and Mercury Mark II, would take the name of Project Apollo. The earliest plans presented to the Space Task Group were for a three-tiered spacecraft that would have separate propulsion, re-entry, and mission modules. Among the mission profiles being considered were circumlunar travel, and ferrying astronauts to and from an orbital space station. The two things it would ultimately do. Five weeks later, NASA would award preliminary contracts to Convair, General Electric, and Martin to produce competing spacecraft design proposals. North American would come in at a later time with its own proposal.
59 years ago today, Explorer 4 was launched atop a Juno I rocket from Pad 5, Cape Canaveral. The probe, similar in design to Explorer 1, carried a pair of Geiger-Mueller tubes and a scintillator detector. The probe investigated the affects of Operation Argus, a series of three nuclear tests conducted at MEO altitude, on the Van Allen belts. The probe lasted about two months on battery power, and re-entered the next year. The probe ended up tumbling, making communication difficult, but useful data was still gathered.
52 years ago today, the final Saturn I rocket was launched from Pad 37B, Cape Kennedy. It carried the AS-105 Apollo CSM boilerplate and the Pegasus 3 micrometeoroid satellite, both also the last of their kind. The launch test operated perfectly, including a successful jettison of the launch escape system. Both were placed in a roughly 325-mile circular orbit. Pegasus 3 would re-enter in August 1969, while AS-105 would re-enter in 1975. It would be seven months before the first Saturn IB launch would take place.
@Orlando Rays I really appreciate you posing this stuff. I don't always have time to read it all but thanks all the same.
40 years ago today, a drop test was conducted for the Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster. An unloaded SRB was dropped from an NB-52, a B-52B bomber that was modified for NASA research purposes, in order to test its parachute recovery system.
52 years ago today, Apollo command module Boilerplate 6A was dropped to test the CM's Earth landing capability for the contingency of a pad abort, or other launch escape system activation near the surface. The initial auxillary brake parachute deployment caused severe oscillations in the capsule, severing some electrical lines. Although the parachutes deployed as planned, the initial brake chute never separated, resulting in all the other parachutes failing to fully inflate. The capsule ended up landing at 50 ft/s, more than twice as fast as planned, sustaining considerable damage.
58 years today, Explorer 6 was launched atop a Thor-Able rocket from Pad 17A, Cape Canaveral. The first use of the Able III upper stage, it was the first successful use of Thor-Able for an orbital launch. Explorer 6, in addition to the radiation experiments ubiquitous to the early Explorer probes, also carried a camera, and took the first ever picture of Earth. It was taken at an altitude of 17,000 km. It was also used as a target for an ABM test. A Bold Orion ABM rocket passed within 4 miles of the probe. Its early solar cells decayed quickly, and it failed after two months of operation. It re-entered in July 1961.
16 years ago today, Genesis was launched atop a Delta II 7326 rocket from Pad 17A, Cape Canaveral. Genesis was sent to the Sun-Earth L1 Lagrangian point to collect particles of the solar wind. The intent was to get a better gauge of the elemental makeup of the Sun, and provide the basis of a clearinghouse for Solar samples similar to the cache of samples provided by the lunar landings. The probe was inserted into a Lissajous orbit to L1, and then in an L1 halo orbit on November 16, 2001. It would spend 2 1/2 years collecting samples. On April 22, 2004, Genesis re-entered a Lissajous orbit. After a trajectory around Sun-Earth L2, it did a fly-by of Earth. The collector array was stowed in a recovery capsule, and released for re-entry on September 8, 2004. The bus probe returned to L1 in November 2004, then was placed in hibernation mode. It is believed the probe entered heliocentric orbit in February 2005 in an orbit leading Earth. As for the recovery capsule... you already know how this story ends.
57 years ago today, Discoverer 13, the 13th launch of the Corona reconnaissance satellite series, was launched atop a Thor-Agena rocket from Pad 1E, Vandenberg AFB. It did not carry a camera, but was the first full test of the recovery system. The day after it was launched, the recovery capsule was released, and de-orbited. It was successfully recovered over the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii. It was the first spacecraft to be recovered intact from orbit, beating Korabl-Sputnik 2 by nine days. The spacecraft bus would re-enter two months later.
57 years ago today, Discoverer 14 was launched atop a Thor-Agena rocket from Pad 1E, Vandenberg AFB. It was the first fully-functioning Corona reconnaissance satellite. Its on-board camera took photographs for several hours, including photos of the Soviet Union. The film was ejected after a day, and recovered mid-air by a C-119 aircraft over the Pacific Ocean. The photo above is of Vandenberg AFB. The spacecraft bus re-entered a month later.
45 years ago today, the Orbiting Astronomical Observer 3 (OAO-3) Copernicus satellite was launched atop an Atlas-Centaur rocket from Pad 36B, Cape Kennedy. OAO-3 was the fourth launch of the OAO program. The primary payload was an 80cm UV telescope. It also carried an X-ray detector. Its primary discovery was long-period pulsars. It ceased operation in February 1981. The OAO program would lead directory to the Hubble Space Telescope.
43 years ago today, Soyuz 15 was launched to the Salyut 3 space station atop a Soyuz rocket from Site 1/5, Baikonur Cosmodrome. The spacecraft failed to dock with the space station. Due to the limited battery power of the Soyuz Ferry 7K-T model, cosmonauts Gennadi Sarafanov and Lev Dyomin had to return to Earth after only 2 days in orbit. The program finally got tired of the constant failure of the Igla docking system, and resolved to fix its issues before another space station flight. This doomed Salyut 3. The spacecraft originally intended to be Soyuz 16 would instead fly to Salyut 4 unmanned as Soyuz 20 in late 1975.