Space - Tullamore Astronomical Society

SPACEFLIGHT
News
Russian Spacecraft Fails to Boost ISS into Higher Orbit
A Russian spacecraft stopped short of boosting the
International Space Station (ISS) into a higher orbit
on Tuesday October 25 th when its engines
unexpectedly shut down in mid-manoeuvre, Russian
space officials said. After the first turn-on of the
engines, they turned off spontaneously.
The failed orbital manoeuvre poses no danger to
the ISS or its two-astronaut crew, Expedition 12
commander Bill McArthur and flight engineer Valery
Tokarev, and engineers are currently studying the glitch,
according to a Federal Space Agency statement. There is
no forecast at the moment as to when they would try
again.
Russian and U.S. space station flight controllers were
expected to perform two engine burns that day using the
Progress 19 spacecraft’s engines evening to raise the
ISS into a higher orbit. The spacecraft is docked at the
aft end of the station’s Zvezda module.
The engine burns, each scheduled to run 11
minutes and 40 seconds, were expected to raise the ISS
into an orbit that hits 224 statute miles (360 kilometres)
at its highest point, a bit higher that the station’s current
orbital peak of 220 statute miles (354 kilometres),
NASA officials. But the Progress engines switched off
less than two minutes into the first burn, NASA officials
said, adding that there appeared to be a communications
problem between the spacecraft's thrusters and Russian
navigation computers, which shut down the engines as
designed due to the data dropout.
The brief engine burn did accelerate the ISS by
about 1.04 feet per second (0.31 meters per second) and
raised the lowest point of the station's orbit - 211 miles
(339 kilometres) - by about 0.7 miles (1.1 kilometres).
Other engines could be used to boost the space
station’s orbit, but Russian space officials are still
evaluating the glitch Tuesday’s altitude-raising
manoeuvre was slated to place the station into the proper
position for a second orbital boost later this year that
would set up the ISS to receive an unmanned Russianbuilt
cargo ship – Progress 20 – slated to launch toward
the space station on December 21 st .
Progress 20 will ferry vital supplies, spare parts
and equipment to McArthur and Tokarev, who began
their six-month tour aboard the ISS in October.
Contamination cleanup continues on Venus Express
orbiter
European scientists are
reasonably confident their Venus
Express spacecraft will launch to
Earth's nearest neighbour before
the tight window of opportunity
when the planets are aligned
slams shut in a few weeks. The
mission was supposed to blast off
on Wednesday October 26 th , from
Baikonur Cosmodrome in
Kazakhstan. But contamination
found on the satellite forced launch
preparations to stop, putting Venus
Express into an unplanned holding
pattern.
The spacecraft was already
mated to its Soyuz rocket inside an
assembly building in advance of
being rolled to the launch pad.
Then came the discovery of some
insulation material that had come
off the Fregat upper stage and was
floating free inside the rocket's
nose cone where Venus Express sat
encapsulated for launch.
Over the previous
weekend, the Fregat and spacecraft
still tucked inside the nose cone
were detached from the Soyuz for
train transport to another facility
25 miles away. The shroud was
opened that Monday, enabling
inspections of Venus Express by
technicians to determine if any
damage had occurred by the
insulation.
"The scenario is so far
very encouraging, as only fairly
large particles, pieces of the
insulating material initially
covering the launcher's Fregat
upper stage, have been found on
the body of the spacecraft," ESA
said in a press statement.
"These have been easy to
identify by naked eye or with UV
lamps, and are being carefully
removed with tweezers, vacuumcleaners
or nitrogen gas airbrushes,
according to size."
The cleaning will continue,
followed by re-installation of the
nose cone and transfer back to the
Soyuz rocket's assembly building.
Although a new launch date has
not been set, lift-off is expected to
be targeted for sometime between
November 6 and 9. Venus Express
must launch by November 24 to
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – Tullamore Astronomical Society 21