Xref: utzoo sci.space:25989 sci.space.shuttle:6766 Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle Path: utzoo!henry From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) Subject: space news from Oct 10 AW&ST Message-ID: <1990Dec4.052154.19233@zoo.toronto.edu> Organization: U of Toronto Zoology Date: Tue, 4 Dec 90 05:21:54 GMT Asiasat to decide on buying a second satellite by year end. An orbital slot is already reserved. The hope is to have Asiasat 2 in orbit by 1993, as Asiasat 1 was fully booked much more quickly than expected. Second shuttle carrier completes structural changes and goes to Texas for painting. [AW&ST called it the "third", which is wrong.] SL-16 (Zenit) booster explodes on the pad at Baikonur Oct 4. The first stage, which is also used as the strap-on booster for Energia, failed. [The Soviets have sworn up and down that the problem will be sorted out before Cape York starts buying Zenits.] USAF and NASA approve Palmdale as the site for the X-30 headquarters. If X-30 construction ever goes ahead, it's likely to be at Palmdale. OTA report on space debris warns that action is needed or low orbit may become increasingly dangerous to use within a decade. Instruments capable of surveying the debris population down to about 1cm -- roughly the largest that it is easy to shield against -- are urgently needed, as current radars give up at about 15cm. OTA also says that a number of common beliefs about space debris are wrong, such as the notion that the Soviets cause most of it (the US is about equally to blame), and the notion that it is growing because of higher launch rates (world launch rates have been flat since about 1965 [when the Soviets hit their stride]). Discovery launches Ulysses successfully. Launch was 12 minutes late due to a short weather hold and minor technical problems. The only problem during ascent was an indication that the primary controller for the flash evaporator system might be failing; the crew switched to the backup controller with no problems, and the alarm was later found to be false. There were no hydrogen leaks. There were a few protestors at the KSC gates upset about the plutonium aboard, but Washington courts refused to stop the launch in a ruling Oct 5. Ulysses departed at 34,130mph, the fastest Earth escape velocity ever used. It crossed the Moon's orbit seven hours after upper-stage ignition. Columbia returned to VAB from pad 39B Oct 9 due to high winds, after being moved from pad 39A to free that pad for Atlantis. (Pad 39A has some secure communications equipment that 39B lacks.) Both Columbia and Atlantis will go out to the pads as soon as winds abate. The Atlantis launch will be the last "secure mode" shuttle launch, as the USAF shifts its major payloads to Titan IV. It is possible that later military flights may carry secret experiments, but the flights as a whole will not be secret, and they will not be common either. Third Titan IV launch is still not back on the Cape range schedule. A mid-Sept launch attempt was scrubbed due to SRB nozzle problems, and then further problems, details not released, developed. HST scientists, notably the ESA ones, urge NASA to put a high priority on dealing with the mirror problems for all instruments, not just for JPL's WFPC. In particular, ESA's Faint Object Camera needs fixing even worse. A panel is working on possible HST fixes, including some fairly wild ideas, like sending an astronaut down HST's barrel to replace "a mirror" [presumably the secondary], or bringing hardware [the FOC?] inside a Spacehab module so the astronauts can make repairs in a shirtsleeve environment. ESA sends clear warning signals: Ulysses notwithstanding, NASA had better get its act together on the space station soon, or the Europeans may decide to forget about participating. Next spring, ESA makes major decisions about Hermes and the Columbus free-flyer and station module. The station module just might get de-emphasized, delayed, or dumped if things aren't on track by then. "We need to have a clearer picture, a much clearer picture about where the US is going with the station..." Europeans are starting to suggest that if Europe is going to be involved in Moon/Mars, perhaps that project should be run by a multinational organization with the US just another member nation, rather than in command. In any case, "we will not start giving serious consideration to SEI until the space station program is on solid ground". Pictures of the bottom of Puget Sound, taken by the Soviet Almaz radarsat. Wolfgang Wild, head of DARA [the German space agency], calls for serious stretchout of Hermes and Columbus, on the grounds that the current budgets and schedules are seriously unrealistic. Many ESA people are voicing quiet agreement. Wild says that German reunification will not alter Germany's active support for spaceflight, but there will be some small changes in direction: less funding for microgravity research, a sharp increase in Earth-observation work, generally level funding for science and exploration in general, a push to have industry fund more of the work on commercially-promising comsat and navsat systems, and continuing modest manned spaceflight (including a German cosmohaut on Mir in 1992 and the German "Spacelab D2" shuttle mission the same year). Wild says reunification does not affect Germany's status within ESA: East Germany has become part of the Federal Republic Of Germany, which was and still is an ESA member. However, Germany's contribution to ESA's "mandatory program" funding will rise slightly because that funding is based on GNP. Rocketdyne tests a new design, with new lubricants, for the SSME high-pressure fuel turbopump. The hope is that this will boost pump life to 20 flights. Current life is, well, poor: the pumps are rated at four flights maximum, and none has actually flown more than three. Postmortem on the latest H-2 engine fire says the high-pressure oxygen pump exploded. NASDA engineers are trying to sort out whether major redesign will be needed. [Looks like I was right when I predicted that they'd regret using the SSME-like engine cycle.] Soviets say that a "crane-type manipulator" will be installed on Mir for use in major EVA work. Its first job will be to help in moving a pair of large solar arrays from Kristall to Kvant 1, a 40m move for two 500kg masses. The move will occur next year. The arrays are designed for such moves, and can be retracted to their stowed position for easier handling. Letter from the External Relations directory of NASDA, saying that limits on photography during AW&ST's visit to Tanegashima were due to safety regulations related to the engine test then being readied, not to desire to limit technology transfer. AW&ST replies that this reason/excuse was not mentioned at the time. -- "The average pointer, statistically, |Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology points somewhere in X." -Hugh Redelmeier| henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com