Preparations for the launch of the NASA Juno mission to Jupiter are proceeding well, as the mission passed through its Flight Readiness Review (FRR). Juno will be riding on the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V, a vehicle which arrived on an Antonov An-124 for the final time, as Atlas’ began sharing a ride on the [...]
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For the second time this week this week alone, China has launched a satellite – this time from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. The Shi Jian 11-02 satellite was launch at 07:42UTC by a Long March 2C (Chang Zheng-2C) launch vehicle from the SLS-2 launch pad – as the Chinese prepare for a busy August.
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Providing stunning images of the grand finale of the Shuttle Program, the External Tank (ET) camera on ET-138 concluded a 22-flight legacy - beaming back images of the tank’s performance through ascent. However, a camera modification was ultimately unsuccessful in transmitting much more than static footage of the tank as it tumbled into Earth’s atmosphere for its [...]
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A new schedule, created by NASA, has provided a “preliminary, budget restricted” manifest which places the first flight of the fully evolved Space Launch System (SLS) in the year 2032. The information includes details on the chosen configuration and hardware, but provides a depressing schedule, with a flight rate of just one mission per year, [...]
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China has launched another navigation satellite, with the BeiDou-2 ‘Compass-IGSO-4′ lofted into orbit by a Long March 3A (Chang Zheng-3A). The launch took place from the LC3 launch complex of the Xi Chang Satellite Launch Center, in Sichuan Province, with lift-off timed at 21:44 UTC – a T-0 slightly delayed due to poor weather in [...]
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Adding to the long list that is her legacy, Atlantis’ successful final test of Neptec’s TriDAR rendezvous and docking system has resulted in Orbital completing a deal to use high tech sensors on their Cygnus spacecraft. With the orbiter’s also testing DragonEye for SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft, the two commercial vehicles will “Tally Ho” the ISS [...]
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Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Director Bob Cabana has spoken of his emotions during and after the final NASA Space Shuttle mission, ranging from launch day, through to seeing Atlantis return to her final resting place. Despite being known as a huge advocate of the transition to commercial launches, Mr Cabana chose to focus on the [...]
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Shuttle Atlantis has been given top marks for her return to Earth via the Mission Evaluation Room (MER) landing report – normally a highly technical, emotionless review into vehicle performance. However, as Atlantis begins down processing for her retirement, her team of engineers and controllers signed off on a report which included numerous notes of [...]
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Atlantis has concluded her historic 13-day mission to the International Space Station with a perfect landing at KSC. With a ‘go’ for deorbit and entry operations from Flight Controllers – confirmed thanks to excellent weather conditions at Kennedy – Atlantis’ 0556 EDT landing was saluted with a four minute visible, overhead pass by the ISS just nine [...]
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Following the expected clearance of the Thermal Protection System (TPS) – which was re-checked during Late Inspections, along with the successful checkouts of the systems the orbiter will use to carry her crew back to Earth – Atlantis is in the final hours of orbiting the planet, ahead of an expected early morning landing at [...]
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Space Shuttle orbiter Atlantis has undocked from the ISS for the final time, ahead of carrying out the unique and stunning flyaround. And while the moment resulted in dazzling images of a graceful orbital ballet, as well as a multitude of emotions, Atlantis once again lent a helping hand to future spacecraft as she performed [...]
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NASA and United Launch Alliance (ULA) have announced an agreement for technical support via NASA’s Commercial Crew Program focusing on the human rating of the Atlas V launch vehicle. The unfunded act is expected to result in certifying Atlas V to launch NASA astronauts riding in vehicles such as the Dream Chaser, Boeing CST-100 and [...]
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Teams on the ground are working through possible root causes into the temporary failure of one of Atlantis’ General Purpose Computers (GPC-4), with a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) listed as one of three potential contributing factors. The computer now appears to be functioning normally, as Atlantis and her crew head into the final part of [...]
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International Launch Services (ILS) have launched their Proton-M rocket again on Friday, as the workhorse lofted the SES-3 and KazSat-2 telecommunications satellites – the first “shared” ILS Proton launch – into a geosynchronous transfer orbit. Launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan was on schedule at 23:16pm UTC, ahead of over nine hours of flight [...]
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The United Launch Alliance (ULA) have launched their Delta IV rocket from Cape Canaveral on Saturday morning, carrying the second in a series of next-generation Global Positioning Satellites - GPS IIF-2. Launch occurred at the start of nineteen minute window which opened at 06:45 UTC (02:45 EDT).
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The Indian Space Research Organisation have successfully launched a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), placing the GSAT-12 satellite into orbit. Liftoff occurred on time at 11:18 UTC (16:48 local time), from the Second Launch Pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre on Sriharikota Island – prior to a successful deployment of the telecommunications satellite.
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A master alarm onboard Atlantis woke the crew from their sleep, after a General Purpose Computer (GPC-4) suffered a problem. The issue follows the failure – and subsequent recovery – of GPC-3 earlier in the mission. Meanwhile, the Damage Assessment Team (DAT) provided their full review of the orbiter’s Thermal Protection System (TPS), which has [...]
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With Discovery now enjoying a month-long vacation inside the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), following her rollover on Wednesday, the long-term future for the Orbiter Processing Facilities (OPFs) will be heavily focused on attracting the new fleet of commercial vehicles, as the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) transitions into a multi-purpose spaceport.
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Starsem’s Soyuz 2-1A launch vehicle has launched six Globalstar satellites from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Launch was on time, at the opening of the window at 2:27am UTC on Wednesday, following a 24 hour scrub due to a technical issue with the launch pad, which was then followed by an additional one day postponement to [...]
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With STS-135/Atlantis now officially extended by one day, the STS-135/Atlantis crew and the ISS crew are pressing forward with the immediate days of the mission as written by the pre-launch timeline. To that end, ISS crewmembers Mike Fossum and Ron Garan worked through the only EVA (spacewalk) of the docked portion of the Atlantis’s mission, [...]
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