Chinese Long March 2D launches Shiyan-5

CASC - China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation logo.

Nov. 25, 2013

The Chinese were back in action again on Monday, launching the Shiyan Weixing-5 (SW-5) satellite via their Long March 2D rocket. Launch occurred at 02:12 UTC from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.

Long March 2D rocket. launch

SW-5 uses the CAST-100 satellite platform and is possibly related to the medium size rapid surveying earth observation satellite platform that can house optical, SAR and other payloads for rapid target acquisition.

This was featured in one news article early in 2013 while mechanical tests were being performed on SW-5.

The first Shiyan satellite was launched on April 18, 2004, by a Long March-2C rocket from the Xichang satellite Launch Center.

This was China’s first experimental digital imaging system capable of stereo Earth-terrain mapping, also testing the digital imaging capability for the then new generation of Chinese military reconnaissance spacecraft in development.

Shiyan-5 satellite

Similar to Shiyan-1, Shiyan-2 was launched on November 18, 2004, also from Xichang and using a Long March-2C launch vehicle. Shiyan-3 and Shiyan-4 were both launched from Jiuquan. Both satellites were experimental vehicles with digital imaging system capable of stereo Earth-terrain mapping. Shiyan-3 was launched on November 5, 2008, and Shiyan-4 was launched on November 20, 2011.

Both satellites didn’t travel alone on their Long March-2D launch vehicles, which also launched the mini ‘store and forward’ communication satellites Chuangxin-1 developed by CAS (China Academy of Science), Shanghai Academy of Space Technology and Shanghai Telecomm.

This launch was the 186th Chinese successful orbital launch and the 185th launch of a Long March launch vehicle, also becoming the 63rd orbital launch from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, the seventh orbital launch from Jiuquan this year and the 12th Chinese orbital launch in 2013.

For more information about China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC), visit: http://www.spacechina.com/n25/jtindex.html

Images, Text, Credits: CASC / Orbiter.ch Aerospace.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Russian Cargo Ship Heading to Space Station

ROSCOSMOS - Russian Vehicles patch.

Nov. 25, 2013

Image above: The ISS Progress 53 resupply ship atop a Soyuz booster awaits liftoff from the Site 31 launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Image Credit: TsENKI.

A new Russian Progress space freighter loaded with nearly three tons of food, fuel, supplies and holiday gifts for the International Space Station’s Expedition 38 crew launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 3:53 p.m. EST Monday (2:53 a.m. Tuesday, Kazakh time).  During its four-day journey to the orbiting complex, the ISS Progress 53 cargo ship will conduct a “flyby” of the station to test an enhanced docking system for future Russian spacecraft.

At the time of launch, the station was flying about 260 miles over southern Russia, near the northeast border with Kazakhstan.

Russian Cargo Spacecraft Heads to Space Station with Holiday Goodies

Progress 53, which along with its Soyuz booster was rolled out to Baikonur’s Site 31 launch pad on Saturday,  is delivering  1,763 pounds of propellant, 48 pounds of oxygen, 57 pounds of air, 925 pounds of water and 3,119 pounds of spare parts and experiment hardware to the station.

Once the Progress reached its preliminary orbit nine minutes after launch and deployed its solar arrays, it was set to begin a series of automated engine burns to put it on track to fly within one mile of the station on Wednesday. That close encounter “flyby” Wednesday at 4:53 p.m. will test lighter, more-efficient Kurs automated rendezvous system hardware for upgraded Soyuz and Progress vehicles.  After it finishes its “flyby”, the Progress will loop above and behind the station, returning Friday for a docking to the aft port of the Zvezda service module at 5:28 p.m.

Image above: The Russian Mission Control Center monitors the ISS Progress 53 cargo ship as it heads to its preliminary orbit. Image Credit: NASA TV.

Meanwhile the Expedition 38 crew aboard the station continued their support of station science and maintenance Monday.

Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio spent most of his morning preparing hardware and test samples inside BioLab, a research facility located in the Columbus laboratory. BioLab is used to perform space biology experiments on microorganisms, cells, tissue cultures, plants and small invertebrates.  Results from experiments performed inside this facility could benefit biomedical research in such areas as immunology, pharmacology, bone demineralization and biotechnology.

Image above: Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio works with BioLab hardware in this photo posted from the NASA astronaut's Twitter account, @AstroRM. Image Credit: NASA.

Inside the station’s 7-windowed cupola, Flight Engineer Koichi Wakata set up the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s ultra-high definition camera system to capture detailed imagery and video of Comet ISON as it orbits around the sun.

Afterward, Wakata participated in the periodic Body Measures experiment, which collects anthropometric data to help researchers understand the magnitude and variability of the changes to body measurements during spaceflight. Predicting these changes will maximize crew performance, prevent injury and reduce time spent altering or adjusting suits and workstations to accommodate anthropometrics. Flight Engineer Mike Hopkins assisted Wakata throughout the experiment session, setting up the calibration tape, collecting data and taking photographs.

Image above: Equipped with seven windows, the station's cupola probably has exponentially more beneficial facets than it has windows. Image Credit: NASA.

Hopkins rounded out his day installing wire harnesses in the Harmony node to support the installation of Ethernet video cables for the station’s local area network.  These new cables will provide Ethernet connectivity to the visiting vehicles that dock to  Harmony’s Earth-facing port.  The first required use of this capability will take place when the SpaceX-3 commercial cargo ship arrives in February 2014.

On the Russian side of the complex, Commander Oleg Kotov and Flight Engineer Sergey Ryazanskiy conducted the Bar experiment, studying methods and instruments for detecting the location of an air leak from one of the station’s modules.

In advance of the arrival of Progress 53, Flight Engineer Mikhail Tyurin conducted a test of the MPEG2 video stream over the Ku-band system. Tyurin  also performed the Uragan Earth-observation experiment, which seeks to document and predict the development of natural and man-made disasters on Earth.

For more information about the International Space Station (ISS), visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: ROSCOSMOS TV / NASA TV / NASA.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Hubble Sees Anemic Spiral NGC 4921

NASA - Hubble Space Telescope patch.

Nov. 25, 2013

How far away is spiral galaxy NGC 4921? Although presently estimated to be about 310 million light years distant, a more precise determination could be coupled with its known recession speed to help humanity better calibrate the expansion rate of the entire visible universe. Toward this goal, several images were taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in order to help identify key stellar distance markers known as Cepheid variable stars. Since NGC 4921 is a member of the Coma Cluster of Galaxies, refining its distance would also allow a better distance determination to one of the largest nearby clusters in the local universe. The magnificent spiral NGC 4921 has been informally dubbed anemic because of its low rate of star formation and low surface brightness. Visible in the above image are, from the center, a bright nucleus, a bright central bar, a prominent ring of dark dust, blue clusters of recently formed stars, several smaller companion galaxies, unrelated galaxies in the far distant universe, and unrelated stars in our Milky Way Galaxy.

Notes:

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.

ESA Hubble website: http://www.spacetelescope.org/

NASA Hubble website: http://hubblesite.org/

Image Credits: Hubble Legacy Archive, ESA, NASA.

Cheers, Orbiter.ch

NASA Releases Comet ISON Images from STEREO

NASA - STEREO Mission logo.

Nov. 22, 2013

Animated image above: Comet ISON appeared in the higher-resolution HI-1 camera on NASA's STEREO-A spacecraft. Dark "clouds" coming from the right are more dense areas in the solar wind, causing ripples in Comet Encke's tail. Using comet tails as tracers can provide valuable data about solar wind conditions near the sun. Image Credit: Karl Battams/NASA/STEREO/CIOC.

Comet ISON entered the field of view of the HI-1 camera on NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, or STEREO, on Nov. 21, 2013, and the comet shows up clearly, appearing to still be intact.

Image above: Comet ISON entered the view of NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory on Nov. 21, 2013, where it can be seen with Earth, Mercury and comet 2P/Encke. Image Credit: Karl Battams/NASA/STEREO/CIOC.

Officially labeled as Comet C/2012 S1, ISON can be seen in these images along with Earth, Mercury and Comet 2P/Encke. The tails streaking out from behind both comets can be seen moving along with the steady stream of particles – called the solar wind – that flows out from the sun.

For more information about STEREO Mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stereo/main/ and http://stereo.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Image (mentioned), Text, Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center / Karen C. Fox.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Checking in on Sentinel-1A

ESA logo labeled.

22 November 2013

Sentinel-1

The media had a sneak peek at the first Sentinel satellite today ahead of its launch next spring.

ESA is developing the Earth-observing Sentinel missions to meet the needs of Europe’s Copernicus programme.

The first in the series, Sentinel-1, will provide all-weather, day-or-night radar images for emergency responses, marine and land monitoring, civil security and climate studies, among other applications.

It will ensure the continuity of C-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data, building on ESA’s heritage C-band SAR systems on ERS-1, ERS-2 and Envisat. Sentinel-1 will provide global coverage with a focus on Europe, Canada and the main shipping routes, with data delivered within a few hours of acquisition – a big improvement over existing SAR systems.

The mission will fly a pair of satellites, the first of which is planned to be launched next spring from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. Its sister Sentinel-1B will follow in 2015.

On Friday, Thales Alenia Space hosted a media event on the mission in Rome, Italy. ESA’s Sentinel-1 Project Manager, Ramón Torres, gave an overview of the satellite, designed by ESA and realised by European industry.

Rome, Italy

Thales Alenia Space Italy is prime contractor, with Astrium Germany responsible for the C-SAR payload incorporating the central radar electronics developed by Astrium UK.

Following briefings by ESA, Thales Alenia Space’s President and CEO Elisio Prette, and European Commission Vice President Antonio Tajani, media representatives visited Sentinel-1A in the cleanroom.

Earlier this year, the satellite passed a series of thermal tests in vacuum that simulated operations in space. From Rome, Sentinel-1 will travel on 25 November to Thales Alenia Space in Cannes, France, for the next set of tests that will simulate the launch environment as demonstrate its radio-frequency compatibility.

A final test conducted with ESA’s European Satellite Operations Centre in Darmstadt early in 2014 will validate the whole system, before the satellite is shipped to the launch site.

Related missions:

Sentinel-1: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1

Related links:

Thales Alenia Space: http://www.thalesgroup.com/Markets/Space/Home/

European Commission Copernicus site: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/space/copernicus/

Images, Text, Credits: ESA / ATG Medialab.

Cheers, Orbiter.ch

ESA’s Swarm trio on its way to watch over our planet’s magnetic shield

ESA - SWARM Mission logo.

22 November 2013

Swarm Liftoff

ESA’s three-satellite Swarm constellation was lofted into a near-polar orbit by a Russian Rockot launcher this afternoon. For four years, it will monitor Earth’s magnetic field, from the depth of our planet’s core to the heights of its upper atmosphere.

The Swarm satellites will give us unprecedented insights into the complex workings of the magnetic shield that protects our biosphere from charged particles and cosmic radiation. They will perform precise measurements to evaluate its current weakening and understand how it contributes to global change.

 Launch of Rokot with European Swarm Satellites

The Rockot launcher lifted off from the Plesetsk spaceport in northern Russia at 12:02 GMT (13:02 CET) on 22 November.

Some 91 minutes later, its Breeze-KM upper stage released the three satellites into a near-polar circular orbit at an altitude of 490 km.

Contact was established with the trio minutes later through the Kiruna station in Sweden and the Svalbard station in Norway.

All three satellites are controlled by ESA teams at the European Space Operation Centre in Darmstadt, Germany. In the next hours they will deploy their 4 m-long instrument booms. Over the next three months of commissioning, their scientific payloads will be verified and they will move to their respective operational orbits.

The lower pair will fly in formation side by side, about 150 km (10 seconds) apart at the equator and at an initial altitude of 460 km, while the upper satellite will rise to a higher orbit, at 530 km.

Swarm launch separation from Breeze

“Swarm is about to fill a gap in our view of the Earth system and in our monitoring of global change issues,” noted Volker Liebig, ESA’s director for Earth observation.

“It will help us to better understand the field that protects us from the particles and radiation coming from the Sun.”

About Swarm:

Swarm is ESA’s fourth Earth Explorer mission, coming after the successful CryoSat, GOCE and SMOS satellites – all missions that expand our knowledge of Earth and its environment.

ESA's Swarm constellation in orbit

The combination of data collected by Swarm will give precious information on the sources of the magnetic field inside Earth. This includes understanding how the magnetic field is related to the motion of molten iron in the outer core, how the conductivity of the mantle is related to its composition and how the crust has been magnetised over geological timescales.

They will also investigate how the magnetic field relates to Earth’s environment through the radiation belts and their near-Earth effects, including the solar wind energy input into the upper atmosphere.

Swarm an orbit with a difference

Swarm will also be able to distinguish between the various sources of our planet’s magnetic field and ensure continuity in its monitoring from space in conjunction with measurements from ground observatories.

Our magnetic field plays a major role in protecting the biosphere because it generates a bubble around our planet that deflects charged particles and traps them in the radiation belts. This shielding protects all life on Earth from the bombardment of heavy ions coming from the Sun and deep space.

Earth's magnetic field

Since the 1980s, previous missions have showed this field to be weakening, which could be a sign that the north and south magnetic poles are beginning to reverse – known to have occurred on multiple occasions during geological times.

Although such inversions usually take thousands years to complete, a further weakening of our magnetic protection could lead to an increase in events that damage our orbiting satellites or disrupt power grids and other electrical systems on the ground.

About the European Space Agency:

The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. It is an intergovernmental organisation, created in 1975, with the mission to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space delivers benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.

ESA has 20 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, of whom 18 are Member States of the EU.

ESA has Cooperation Agreements with eight other Member States of the EU. Canada takes part in some ESA programmes under a Cooperation Agreement.

ESA is also working with the EU on implementing the Galileo and Copernicus programmes.

By coordinating the financial and intellectual resources of its members, ESA can undertake programmes and activities far beyond the scope of any single European country.

ESA develops the launchers, spacecraft and ground facilities needed to keep Europe at the forefront of global space activities.

Today, it launches satellites for Earth observation, navigation, telecommunications and astronomy, sends probes to the far reaches of the Solar System and cooperates in the human exploration of space.

For more information about Swarm Mission, visit:

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/The_Living_Planet_Programme/Earth_Explorers/Swarm

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/The_Living_Planet_Programme/Earth_Explorers/Swarm/ESA_s_magnetic_field_mission_Swarm

CNES website: http://smsc.cnes.fr/SWARM/Fr/

Images, Videos, Text, Credits: European Space Agency (ESA) / ATG Medialab.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

NASA Spacecraft Begins Collecting Lunar Atmosphere Data

NASA - LADEE Mission patch.

Nov. 21, 2013

NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) is ready to begin collecting science data about the moon.

On Nov. 20, the spacecraft successfully entered its planned orbit around the moon's equator -- a unique position allowing the small probe to make frequent passes from lunar day to lunar night. This will provide a full scope of the changes and processes occurring within the moon's tenuous atmosphere.

LADEE now orbits the moon about every two hours at an altitude of eight to 37 miles (12-60 kilometers) above the moon's surface. For about 100 days, the spacecraft will gather detailed information about the structure and composition of the thin lunar atmosphere and determine whether dust is being lofted into the lunar sky.

Image above: Artist’s concept of NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) spacecraft in orbit above the moon as dust scatters light during the lunar sunset. Image Credit: NASA Ames / Dana Berry.

"A thorough understanding of the characteristics of our lunar neighbor will help researchers understand other small bodies in the solar system, such as asteroids, Mercury, and the moons of outer planets," said Sarah Noble, LADEE program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

Scientists also will be able to study the conditions in the atmosphere during lunar sunrise and sunset, where previous crewed and robotic missions detected a mysterious glow of rays and streamers reaching high into the lunar sky.

“This is what we’ve been waiting for – we are already seeing the shape of things to come,” said Rick Elphic, LADEE project scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.

On Nov. 20, flight controllers in the LADEE Mission Operations Center at Ames confirmed LADEE performed a crucial burn of its orbit control system to lower the spacecraft into its optimal position to enable science collection. Mission managers will continuously monitor the spacecraft's altitude and make adjustments as necessary.

"Due to the lumpiness of the moon's gravitational field, LADEE's orbit requires significant maintenance activity with maneuvers taking place as often as every three to five days, or as infrequently as once every two weeks," said Butler Hine, LADEE project manager at Ames. "LADEE will perform regular orbital maintenance maneuvers to keep the spacecraft’s altitude within a safe range above the surface that maximizes the science return."

In addition to science instruments, the spacecraft carried the Lunar Laser Communications Demonstration, NASA's first high-data-rate laser communication system. It is designed to enable satellite communication at rates similar to those of high-speed fiber optic networks on Earth. The system was tested successfully during the commissioning phase of the mission, while LADEE was still at a higher altitude.

LADEE was launched Sept. 6 on a U.S. Air Force Minotaur V, an excess ballistic missile converted into a space launch vehicle and operated by Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Va. LADEE is the first spacecraft designed, developed, built, integrated and tested at Ames. It also was the first probe launched beyond Earth orbit from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on the Virginia coast.

NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington funds the LADEE mission. Ames manages the overall mission and serves as a base for mission operations and real-time control of the probe. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages the science instruments and technology demonstration payload, the science operations center and overall mission support. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages LADEE within the Lunar Quest Program Office.

For more information about the LADEE mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ladee

For more information about Ames, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ames

Image (mnetioned), Text, Credits: NASA / Dwayne Brown / Ames Research Center / Rachel Hoover.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch