The main drive to return ET-137 to flight status is continuing this week, with focus being placed on assurances a stringer defect does not result in foam liberations during ascent, with new documentation showing even small foam losses from the flange area has the ability to cause critical damage to the orbiter. Meanwhile, managerial memos [...]
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Despite the large amount of progress made towards flight rationale – called for in relation to Discovery’s External Tank (ET-137) stringer cracks – teams are heading into another week of deliberations, with a large amount of work ahead of them. Although STS-133 is threatening to move into next year, NASA managers will continue to evaluate [...]
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Arianespace are back on the pace, with another dual launch taking place on Friday via their Ariane 5 ECA launch vehicle. The European workhorse is lofting HYLAS 1 and Intelsat 17 into their transfer orbits, with lift-off on time at 18:39 GMT – launching from the European Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
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NASA astronauts Douglas Wheelock and Shannon Walker, and Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin have landed back on Earth in their Soyuz TMA-19 spacecraft. The trio touched down in the central steppes of Kazakhstan at 11:46 pm EST (04:46 Friday GMT). Meanwhile, ISS managers continue to refine the visiting vehicle manifest, which now reaches deep into 2012.
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China launched the second Shen Tong-1 military communications satellite via a CZ-3A Chang Zheng-3A (Y19) launch vehicle, providing secured voice/data communications services for PLA ground users in Ku-band. Receiving the designation ZX-20A ZhongZhing-20A, the satellite was launched from the Xi Chang Satellite Launch Center, in Sichuan Province at 00:09 loca time on Friday.
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A Christmas mission may be the cards for Discovery’s final mission, as managers at the Program Requirements Control Board (PRCB) decided against shooting for the early December launch window opportunities. More work is required on assessing the status of External Tank (ET-137), resulting in a move to the December 17-20 window – although this target [...]
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Progress continues to be made in returning Discovery’s External Tank (ET-137) back to flight status, as nearly all of the physical repairs are completed on what were two cracked stringers on the LOX/Intertank flange area. With flight rationale work building, December 3 and December 5 – the latter including a Tanking Test – are being [...]
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As Shuttle Program engineers continue to work through the final phases of repairs to Discovery’s External Tank Intertank stringers, focus now turns in earnest toward a discussion on the development/approval of flight rationale for ET-137, as well as the available launch opportunities for STS-133/Discovery in December 2010 and potentially early January 2011 – before a [...]
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The United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta IV vehicle has launched the classified NROL-32 payload for the United States National Reconnaissance Office from Space Launch Complex 37B, Cape Canaveral, at 5:58pm EST. The launch came after the first attempt was scrubbed for 48 hours due to issues suffered during fuelling - relating to anomalous temperature data signatures detected on [...]
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With the focus firmly placed on the repairs, inspections and required flight rationale for the LOX/Intertank flange stringers, hopes have being raised of a positive outcome by the end of the coming week. However, deputy Space Shuttle Program (SSP) LeRoy Cain dismissed internal rumors of schedule pressure to avoid a slip to next year, by noting [...]
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Orbital Sciences Corporation used their Minotaur IV launch vehicle to loft eight satellites for the United States Government and university research programmes on Friday night. The mission, designated STP S-26, launched from the Kodiak Launch Complex in Alaska one minute into a 90-minute window, with a lift-off time of 20:25 pm Eastern (01:25 UTC).
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As work continues on Discovery’s External Tank’s (ET) Intertank stringers, Space Shuttle Program (SSP) managers are refining Discovery’s (STS-133′s) December launch opportunities – which include the extension of the primary and thus far only confirmed launch window and the potential of both a mid- and late-December launch window should the International Space Station Program choose [...]
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With numerous repair operations ongoing with Discovery’s External Tank (ET-137), managers are creating a number of options to provide some additional flexibility in launching STS-133. As part of the evaluations, the Space Shuttle Program (SSP) have requested input from the International Space Station (ISS) on the option of a launch window which opens on December [...]
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NASA’s End State Flow Review (ESFR) has refined preliminary arrangements and schedules for Discovery’s immediate post STS-133 future, as well as where the orbiter’s SRMS (Shuttle Remote Manipulator System) arms and OBSS (Orbiter Boom Sensor System) arms will end up once the Shuttle Program comes to an end next year.
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Providing Discovery’s External Tank (ET-137) can be repaired and cleared for flight in time for the upcoming launch window, managers have created a preliminary plan for a Tanking Test, built into a six day countdown. In order to avoid a slip to next February, managers are focusing on gaining confidence in the intertank’s condition, which [...]
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The Russian EVA-26 has been completed Monday, with Russian cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin (EV-1), and Oleg Skripochka (EV-2), woking on the outfitting of the exterior of the Service Module (SM) for future assembly work and the support of external experiments. This was the fifth spacewalk for Yurchikhin, and the first for Skripochka.
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Sources in China have confirmed the identity of one of the two female Air Force pilots currently vying to become China’s first woman in space. Captain Wang Yaping, 32, a Transport Pilot in the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF), and another currently unidentified colleague were selected in March, from a pool of fifteen female [...]
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International Launch Services (ILS) have launched the SkyTerra 1 telecommunications satellite via their veteran Proton-M launch vehicle and Breeze-M upper stage on Sunday. Lift-off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan was on schedule at 17:29 GMT, ahead of over nine hours of flight until the spacecraft was placed into orbit.
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Two more cracks has been found on a stringer adjacent to the two original cracks on Discovery’s External Tank (ET-137). The latest crack was found on the far left of removed Thermal Protection System (TPS) foam on the flange area between the Intertank and the LOX tank, but appears to have suffered less stress than [...]
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Concentricity measurements on the removed flight seal on the Ground Umbilical Carrier Plate (GUCP) have found at least one of the potential root causes for last Friday’s leak, with a forward plan to install a replacement carrier plate and seal ahead of a potential Tanking Test. Plans are also being worked to install a doubler [...]
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