Happy 59th birthday to NASA astronaut Gregory H. Johnson. Born in London to an American serviceman, he was raised in Dayton. He earned a bachelor's in aeronautical engineering from Air Force in 1984, then was permitted to complete postgrad research at Columbia, earning a master's in structural engineering in 1985 before his service commitment. "Box", as he is called, was one of the earliest pilots to fly the McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle, and would fly 34 combat missions in Operation Desert Storm. He would take a second peacekeeping mission in late 1992 in the Middle East, before becoming a test pilot in 1993, primarily testing other variants of the F-15, such as NASA's NF-15B STOL test article. He was selected to NASA in the pilot track of Group 17 in 1998. He would fly as pilot of Endeavour twice, flying STS-123 in February 2008, and STS-134 in May 2011. Box retired from the Air Force as a colonel in 2009, and left NASA in 2013. He spent time as President of the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space, which manages experiments on the American side of the International Space Station. He is married, and has three children.
The technology demonstration phase for Ingenuity has reached its end. But its mission has only just begun. On Friday, it made the final flight of its demo phase. It flew 131 m to a new landing point, then rose to 10 m altitude before landing safely. It is now entering its "operations demonstration" phase. It is essentially going to follow Perseverance, taking off and landing every two weeks to trail the rover. It is going to scout the terrain ahead of the rover, so it can route out the best path to get to its next destination. The initial liftoff point, Wright Brothers Field, has been given the ICAO airport code JZRO. J is one of the initial letters not officially used by ICAO for its airport codes, and has officially been reserved for this ceremonial purpose. The helicopter has been given the ICAO type designator IGY.
LAUNCH UPDATE❗ The Black Brant XII launch scheduled for May 12 has been postponed to provide time for inspection of the rocket after the vehicle came in contact with a launcher support during today’s preparations. The next launch opportunity is NET 8:02 pm ET, Friday, May 14.— NASA Wallops (@NASAWallops) May 12, 2021
The next step for Starship is coming. Starship Orbital Launch Attempt details per FCC exhibit:- Staging 170 seconds into flight- Booster will splashdown in the Gulf 20 miles downrange- Starship will perform a soft landing 62 miles northwest of Kauaihttps://t.co/2qBHS6pj73 pic.twitter.com/TlVae0YCBI— Michael Baylor (@MichaelBaylor_) May 13, 2021 Now that SN15 has completed a fully successful soft landing, SpaceX has applied to conduct their first orbital test of the Super Heavy rocket. According to the plans submitted to the FAA, they will launch the Super Heavy first stage from Boca Chica, and staging will take place at T+2:50. The Super Heavy will then boostback, and do a powered descent to a soft water landing in the Gulf of Mexico, 20 miles east of Boca Chica. This is similar to the first water landing runs for the Falcon 9 rocket before they began attempting to land boosters on the drone ships. The Starship will then continue to orbit, with SECO at T+8:40. They are expecting to to achieve orbital velocity, but they will immediately de-orbit Starship, and it will re-enter, then hopefully glide down and do a similar water touchdown practice in the Pacific Ocean, about 100 km northwest of Kauai. It is unknown when the first attempt will be yet. But the first Super Heavy is under construction.
Things are coalescing for the next Starlink launch, L-26, tomorrow evening at 6:58pm EDT. As part of the Capella rideshare, only 52 Starlink comsats will be lifted by B1058.8. The 45th Weather Squadron gives it a 70% chance of weather favorability, increasing to 80% on Sunday evening. Low risk for booster recovery both times. After that, the latest satellite in the Space-Based Infrared System of early-warning satellites, SBIRS-GEO 5, is scheduled to launch atop an Atlas V 421 rocket from Pad 41, Cape Canaveral, at 1:35pm EDT Monday afternoon. It has a 90% chance of weather favorability, with 80% on Tuesday afternoon.
.@30thSpaceWing is blasting off into a new era today at 2 p.m. PST! Vandenberg is renaming the base and redesignating the 30th Space Wing. https://t.co/e97jjiJP6x #SemperSupra pic.twitter.com/TZl4kYxDjt— United States Space Force (@SpaceForceDoD) May 14, 2021 The other shoe is dropping. Today at 5pm EDT, Vandenberg Air Force Base is officially changing to the Space Force desaignation, and the 30th Space Wing is renaming to Space Launch Delta 30.
Not a great harbinger. Right at second stage ignition for the Electron launch "Running Out of Toes", the second stage began to tumble. It cut off shortly after, and telemetry quickly followed. So I'm guessing the anomalous tumble ejected the batteries, or otherwise cut off the electronics. Anyway, the payloads were lost. But at least the first stage completed its controlled splashdown. Rocket Lab has already begun to investigate.
The Starlink L-26 rideshare mission successfully launched last night at 6:56pm EDT. The two rideshare satellites didn't have engine systems of their own, so the second stage needed to place them into their operational orbits itself. So the launch puts its apogee at around 585 km, with SES-2 raising its perigee to 570 km. Immediately after the SES-2 burn, both rideshares were deployed at apogee. It then deployed its stack of Starlink satellites half an orbit later near perigee. The comsats will actually have to lower their orbits to get to their operationational shell, but that will still take less energy than a normal Starlink mission, where they have to roughly double their orbital height. First stage B1058.8 successfully landed on Of Course I Still Love You. The L-28 Starlink launch has been penciled in for next Wednesday, May 26. SpaceX has actually shipped B1063.2 from Vandenberg to Cape Canaveral for the mission. Some of the webcasters were wondering today why B1052 and B1053, the Falcon Heavy side boosters from ArabSat-6A and STP-2, haven't been used since last year. That is currently a mystery. There's no evidence they've been retired, and Elon Musk has said that Falcon Heavy side boosters are just Falcon 9 rockets that could be interchanged in either direction. On the same token, the next Falcon Heavy launch, July's USSF-44 launch, is using new side boosters. With a crunch of first stages, no one knows what B1052 and B1053 are being retained for. Meanwhile, B1067.1 is already reserved for another launch once it completes the SXM-8 launch, currently scheduled for June 1. It has been reserved to loft Crew Dragon Resilience for Inspiration4 in September.
Just saw the sounding rocket launched from the NASA Wallops Flight Facility #NASAWallops pic.twitter.com/NqPNUHN54L— moleman (@Larry59422152) May 17, 2021
Launch of the sounding rocket at Wallops Island seen from Fishersville, Va. @NASA_Wallops pic.twitter.com/Glrju7ovzW— Roger Watson (@RogerWatson21) May 17, 2021
from south jersey, NJ! don’t my mother and my commentary, super big space and NASA fans and we’re just geeking out!!! pic.twitter.com/eM3jWGJ8j1— Chlo 👑 (@chloefreed) May 17, 2021
Didn't see a thing from the deck near Purcellville Va - we usually go down the driveway to a place where we have a more expansive SE view, but there was a DCU game on at the time of the launch so couldn't get off the deck where I could hear it It was cloudy so I'll blame those, not my limited viewing angle. Glad for them it finally went up on the last day of the window.
55 years ago today, Tom Stafford and Gene Cernan were sitting in Gemini 9 atop their Titan II GLV rocket at Pad 19, Cape Kennedy. Over at Pad 14, an Atlas-Agena was launching the third Gemini Agena Target Vehicle, GATV-5004. The starboard booster engine suffered a malfunction. There was confusion as to whether or not they got to staging. The booster was destroyed by range safety at T+7 minutes. Gemini 9 was scrubbed. NASA immediately made plans to launch the backup Augmented Target Docking Adapter instead. That would take two weeks to prepare.
Not even sure I'll be around for this yet, but I'll put the link down. It's for a little less than two hours from now.
Well you didn't miss much. The launch was put in an unplanned hold at around 11am. They found a bad temperature sensor, and ultimately scrubbed for the day. It's already been fixed, and the plan is to launch today at 1:31pm EDT. 45th Weather Squadron gives it an 80% chance of weather favorability today, and 70% tomorrow. Next Wednesday's launch of Starlink L-28 has been pinned down for 2:59pm EDT.
58 years ago today, the second of three KH-6 LANYARD reconnaissance satellites was launched atop a Thor-Agena rocket from Pad 1E, Vandenberg AFB. LANYARD was a super-high resolution (by early 1960s standards) reconnaissance satellite. Built by Lockheed, its Itek camera had a resolution of 6 feet. The first one, launched that March, suffered an issue with its Agena upper stage. This second one was deemed successful, but didn't actually carry any film. The third suffered a camera failure, and the images it did get were of poorer quality than was expected. The program was not continued beyond 1963. This particular one placed in a 315x91-mile orbit, and re-entered after only nine days with that super-low perigee.
One of the things I wanted to do this year was get the rest of these done. I only have two left. Francis Richard Scobee was born on May 19, 1939, in Cle Elum, Washington, pretty much dead center in the state. His family would find their way to suburban Seattle, where he graduated from high school in Auburn in 1957. On graduation, he enlisted in the Air Force. Dick decided to take the long way to flight, working his way through college during his enlistment. After earning his bachelor's in aeronautical engineering from Arizona in 1965, he was commissioned, and within a year, he had earned his pilot's wings. He would serve a tour in Vietnam. He became a test pilot in 1972, and one of his projects was the Boeing 747 airliner. He also got a few flights in the Martin Marietta X-24 lifting body, the General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark, and the Lockheed C-5 Galaxy. Selected to NASA as part of the pilot track of Group 8 in 1978, he was the oldest pilot in the group, and only one other selectee in general (John Fabian) was older. He was fifth in line to get an assignment, selected to STS-41-C, the Solar Max repair mission aboard Challenger in April 1984. His next assignment was as commander for STS-51-L, which was originally planned for late 1985 with the second TDRSS satellite, and a SPARTAN platform to carry out the first vanguard observations of Halley's comet from space. It was eventually delayed to January 22, 1986, with an additional six days of delays due to issues launching STS-61-C. If the last delay on January 27 didn't take place, some of the issues caused by the deep freeze the morning of January 28 may not have occurred. But that would've only kicked the can down the road regarding the fatal flaws that STS-51-L was destined to expose with the Space Shuttle program. Dick's last words were "Roger, go at throttle up", acknowledging Challenger's return to 104% rated thrust following max Q. We already know how that story ends. Fellow astronaut, and by then best friend, Bob Overmyer, was CAPCOM for STS-51-L. He believed to the day he himself died that Dick would've flown Challenger all the way down to the water trying to find a way to save his crew. Presuming they ever regained consciousness from hypoxia if the crew cabin's pressurization was breached. He was 46. He left a wife and two children. His final rank in the Air Force was lieutenant colonel. His widow, June Scobee Rodgers, continues to run the Challenger Center, a science education organization. His son, Richard Scobee, is currently a lieutenant general in the Air Force, and is in charge of Air Force Reserve Command. He led the flyover for Super Bowl XXX on the 10th anniversary of the Challenger disaster.
26 years ago today, the Spektr module was launched atop a Proton-K rocket from Site 81/23, Baikonur Cosmodrome. The Spektr module was originally intended to be a manned orbital reconnaissance station. It was re-purposed as an astronomy base for Mir. It would also bring four solar panels to greatly increase the station's electrical power; at its peak, it provided half of the station's power. As part of the Shuttle-Mir program, Roscosmos got NASA to fund completion of Spektr. One of the pairs of solar panels replaced another originally-intended military system, freeing up an equipment airlock for experiment exposure. It went pretty well...until June 25, 1997. On that day, an experiment in manual guidance of Progress M-34 to dock with Kvant went awry. The spacecraft came in too hot, missed Kvant, and smashed into Spektr. It ricocheted off, and hit one of its solar panels on the way out. The collision punched a hole in the module, causing it to depressurize. The Expedition 23 crew of Vasily Tsibliyev, Alexander Lazutkin, and Michael Foale were forced to seal off Spektr. They had to cut the cables to its solar panels, slashing the station's available electrical power. Two months later, Anatoly Solovyov and Pavel Vinogradov would conduct an intravehicular activity to run a new power cable through a modified hatch cover. 70% of the original power supply was restored. Later EVA inspection determined that Spektr was unrepairable. It would never be used again, but would have to remain attached to Mir so it could use the solar panels.
The Commercial Lunar Payload Services continue to gain momentum. .@jeff_foust at @SpaceNews_Inc writes about the NASA CLPS program and Firefly’s selection of @SpaceX to launch our Blue Ghost lunar lander mission.https://t.co/i839Gewkcm— Firefly Aerospace (@Firefly_Space) May 21, 2021 Firefly Aerospace announced this morning that they have selected SpaceX to launch their Blue Ghost lunar lander. Blue Ghost is being designed with Israeli aerospace firm IAI. It will have a capacity of 50 kg, and will carry instruments to study the lunar regolith, and interaction of the solar wind with Earth's magnetic field. The first launch is planned for 2023 using the Falcon 9 rocket. It will target Mare Crisium. ******** Masten Space Systems is planning a lander called XL-1. They contracted for alaunch with SpaceX last August, but it's unknown yet whether it will use Falcon 9 or Falcon Heavy. XL-1 has a gross mass of 2,400 kg. They have a set of eight experiments assigned by NASA, and are hoping to land somewhere in the South polar region of the Moon. They are currently using a test article to check out its planned landing engines. Outside the CLPS program, they also have a series of next-gen rocket engines using a variety of fuels, including multiple methane-fueled engines, that they are working on for various American government agencies. ******** Also, Lithuania has become an associate member of the European Space Agency. Estonia is already a full member, and Latvia is also an associate member. Lithuanian astronauts wanted! 👩🚀👨🚀🚀We have just officially become the Associate Member of @esa and here's already some great news! ESA has extended the submission period for their astronaut selection to 18 June. Apply here: https://t.co/yUvqpdTTdN— Ausrine Armonaite (@ArmonaiteA) May 21, 2021 They are now posting an advertisement for Lithuanian candidates to join ESA's latest astronaut selection. ESA extended their deadline to June 18.
53 years ago today, it was your run-of-the-mill drama with the Soviet space program. Valentina Tereshkova was fighting appointment to the Committee of Soviet Women. This was only going to drop more PR commitments when all she really wanted was to train for a future mission. Nevermind that they had no intent on letting her fly again. In general, the Soviet space program was trying to get a group of cosmonauts to go on a PR tour of Africa. They were running into resistance from the Politburo. The real reason for the tour was so that cosmonauts would have training on recognizing Southern Hemisphere constellations in preparation for intended lunar missions. Nevermind that those were never going to happen, either.
Late Monday night, SpaceX conducted a static fire for Falcon 9 B1063.2 in preparation for the Starlink L-28 launch. It seems to have gone well, as it is still on for liftoff this afternoon at 2:59pm EDT. The 45th Weather Squadron is giving it a 90% chance of launch favorability, with 80% chance for tomorrow. Cargo Dragon CRS-22 continues to be set for next Thursday, June 3, at 1:29pm EDT. But SXM-8 has been backed off from June 1, and is now listed as "mid-June". The issue appears to be entirely logistics. Both CRS-22 and SXM-8 were set for Pad 40, and I guess SpaceX didn't think they could get it ready for CRS-22 in just 48 hours. So the commercial flight had to yield to the ISS flight.
Starlink L-28 went perfectly yesterday. With the deployment, the initial shell of comsats is now complete, with 1,584 satellites at 550km altitude and 53° inclination. Now, it begins augmentation. I'm not sure where they will deploy next, but they are planning another 1,584 satellites at 540km altitude and 53.2° inclination. 500 more satellites are planned in polar orbit at 560km, and 720 satellites will be placed at 570km and 70° inclination to ensure service to the highest latitudes. All of that is just Phase 1. For Phase 2, Elon is planning on flooding lower orbital altitudes with thousands of satellites. I'm still not sold that this many satellites that close to Earth is worth the super-low latency. Just putting them at like 800km would sacrifice little latency, while opening up a ton more space. ******** Meanwhile, OneWeb is planning its next launch this afternoon at 1:43pm EDT. It will again be atop a Soyuz-2 rocket from Site 1S, Vostochny Cosmodrome. That will make 2021 Vostochny's busiest launch year ever. And half way to its entire history of launches prior to this year.