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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #377

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 377

Today's Topics:
         NASA Headline News for 04/08/91 (Forwarded)
                Re: Mt. Venus
          NASA Prediction Bulletins:  Space Shuttle
             Oil Fires From Space
            Jonathan's Space Report, Apr 2
             Re: Nuclear Rockets
    At what time and date does the shuttle Atlantis land ?
             Re: Fred on the Moon

Administrivia:

    Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to
  [e-mail].  Other mail, esp. [un]subscription requests,
  should be sent to [e-mail], or, if urgent, to
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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 22:23:45 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: NASA Headline News for 04/08/91 (Forwarded)


             Headline News
Internal Communications Branch (P-2) NASA Headquarters

  Monday, April 8, 1991    Audio Service: 202 / 755-1788

This is NASA Headline News for Monday, April 8, 1991 . . .

The STS-37 mission continues to go well.  The orbiter and all five
crewmembers are in good shape and the Gamma Ray Observatory has
been successfully deployed.  Orbiter anomalies to date are very few, the
major item being the failed reaction control system jet.  That jet failed
about 10 minutes after launch on Friday.  It appears to be similar to
previous instances on other orbiters and poses no impact to the mission.
On Sunday, astronauts Jerry Ross and Jay Apt suited up and went
outside for the first contingency spacewalk in six years.  The cause of
the contingency spacewalk was a recalcitrant high-gain antenna on the
Gamma Ray Observatory, which had failed to deploy in six attempts,
including two which had the robot arm gently shaking the payload to help
free the antenna.  Ross and Apt were outside at 2:39 pm EDT and within
17 minutes had freed the antenna.  Following their success, the
spacewalkers continued outside, this time setting up equipment which is
being used today in the space station assembly experiment.  Sunday's was
the first unscheduled spacewalk since the STS-51D flight in April 1985.
During that flight, astronauts Jeff Hoffman and David Griggs attached a
"flyswatter" to the end of the remote manipulator arm to help activate a
switch on the side of the Hughes Syncom satellite.  That satellite was later
retrieved and repaired on a subsequent mission.

Atlantis is scheduled to land at Dryden Flight Research Facility,
California, Wednesday at 12:34 pm EDT.

                   * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Jet Propulsion Laboratory flight controllers report that operations
are proceeding smoothly to bring the Galileo spacecraft out of the
safe mode it went into on March 26.  Galileo's onboard computer
system experienced a transient signal which caused one of the two
redundant computers to shut itself off, causing the other to enter the safe
mode.  JPL expects to have the spacecraft back and fully functioning by
April 25.  The spacecraft is now 37 million miles from Earth and travelling
at a heliocentric velocity of 64,400 miles per hour.

JPL also reports that routine mission operations and cruise-mode data
collection activities are being carried out by the Ulysses spacecraft.  The
spacecraft's fields and particles sensors picked up significant
amounts of science data during the major solar flare which
occurred 10 days ago.  Ulysses is approaching the halfway point in its
journey from Earth to Jupiter -- its first mission milepost.  The spacecraft
is 222 million miles from Earth and heading towards Jupiter at the
heliocentric velocity of 53,770 miles per hour.

                   * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The Marshall Space Flight Center will begin a series of sub-scale
test firings to evaluate materials intended for use in the Advanced Solid
Rocket Motor on Wednesday, April 10.  The first test will be of a 20-
foot-long, 48-inch-diameter, solid rocket motor for approximately 30
seconds.  The test will be conducted at Marshall's East Test Area by
Aerojet Corp., ASRM Division, Iuka, Miss., under contract to Lockheed
Missiles and Space Co., Sunnyvale, Calif.  Royce Mitchell, the ASRM
project manager, said five nozzle material tests and five insulation tests
will be performed at Marshall this year.

                   * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Langley Research Center engineers today begin a series of human
factor studies on the full-scale engineering research model of the HL-
20.  The HL-20 is one of two designs being considered as potential space-
station-era manned vehicles.  Langley Center Director Richard Petersen
begins a two-day series of "state-of-the-center" briefings on Wednesday,
April 10.

                   * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The Stennis Space Center dedicated a new, regional, teacher
resource center on Friday, April 5.  the new center is located in
Moorehead, Miss., at the Mississippi Delta Community College.  The new
teacher resource center will serve the state's delta region as well as
portions of north and central Mississippi.  This is only the second
regional resource center located at a community college.


Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA Select TV.
All times are Eastern.  NASA Select TV is carried on GE Satcom F2R,
transponder 13, C-Band, 72 degrees W Long., Audio 6.8, Frequency 3960
MHz.


Monday, 4/8/91
    8:32 am    Live from Atlantis, continuous coverage of spacewalk
      activities.  Astronauts Jerry Ross and Jay Apt are in Atlantis'
      payload bay testing a variety of hand-hold and equipment-mover
      devices to determine their applicability to assembly of Space
      Station Freedom.  Coverage continues through ...
    2:37 pm    Spacewalk ends, astronauts Ross and Apt reenter Atlantis
          cabin.
    7:00 pm    Replay of Atlantis Flight Day 4 activities.
    7:50 pm    Live from Johnson Space Center, flight director change-of-shift
          briefing.
Tuesday, 4/9/91
    5:22 am    Live from Atlantis, coverage of orbiter mid-deck experiments.
    11:50 am    Live from JSC, flight director change-of-shift briefing.
    7:00 pm    Replay of Atlantis Flight Day 5 activities.
    7:50 pm    Live from JSC, flight director change-of-shift briefing.
Wednesday, 4/10/91
    9:26 am    Scheduled time for Atlantis' deorbit maneuver.
    9:35 am    Live from Dryden Flight Research Facility, preparations for
          Atlantis' landing.
    10:34 am    Scheduled time for Atlantis' landing at Dryden.
    12:00 pm    Live from Dryden, STS-37 post-landing press briefing.

All events and times may change without notice.  This report is filed daily,
Monday through Friday, by 12:00 pm, Eastern.  It is a service of NASA
Headquarters Office of Public Affairs.  Contact:  CREDMOND on
NASAmail or at 202/453-8425.

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 11:35:06 GMT
From: ksr![e-mail]  (Chris Jones)
Subject: Re: Mt. Venus

In article <[e-mail]>, gapickrell@happy writes:
>
>Since I have no idea how to make the temperature calculations I will assume that
>since the pressure went down to 1/3 it original value, the temperature will do
>the same.  One third of 900F is 300F.
>
>                             Is this reasonable?

I'd be surprised.  Leaving aside your assumption that temperature and pressure
scale in this way, one third of 900F is not 300F.  You'd have to convert to
absolute temperatures first (e.g. is one third of 0F 0F?).  Not that the number
should mean anything, but I come up with a value of about -7F.
--
Chris Jones    [e-mail]    {uunet,harvard,world}!ksr!clj

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 11:19:55 GMT
From: udecc.engr.udayton.edu!blackbird.afit.af.mil![e-mail]  (TS Kelso)
Subject: NASA Prediction Bulletins:  Space Shuttle


The most current orbital elements from the NASA Prediction Bulletins are
carried on the Celestial BBS, [phone], and are updated several times
weekly.  Documentation and tracking software are also available on this
system.  As a service to the satellite user community, the most current
elements for the current shuttle mission are provided below.  The Celestial
BBS may be accessed 24 hours/day at 300, 1200, or 2400 baud using 8 data
bits, 1 stop bit, no parity.

STS 37
1 21224U 91 27  A 91 98.00884259  .00009999  00000-0  25599-3 0    72
2 21224  28.4675 222.1389 0011331 289.6409 194.6753 15.37518721   374
--
Dr TS Kelso                           Assistant Professor of Space Operations
[e-mail]          Air Force Institute of Technology

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 15:25:48 GMT
From: bloom-picayune.mit.edu![e-mail]  (Matthew T Velazquez)
Subject: Oil Fires From Space


From article 245 in clari.tw.space:

>  CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (UPI) -- The shuttle Atlantis's crew photographed
>a ``depressing'' cloud of black smoke Sunday billowing up from out-of-
>control oil well fires burning in Kuwait after the Persian Gulf War.
>        As Atlantis sailed over the Middle East during the ship's 27th orbit
>Sunday, the astronauts photographed the region from an altitude of 280
>miles. The shuttle's orbit carried it southeast across Saudi Arabia,
>almost directly over Riyadh.
>        Equipped with a battery of cameras and lenses, Atlantis's four-man,
>one-woman crew snapped a series of pictures that likely will provide a
>bird's-eye view of the devastating fires.


    If somebody out at nasa.gov gets their hands on a legitimate copy
of these photos, would they consider posting them to pub/space/gif at
ames.arc.nasa.gov?  I'm sure lots of folks out there would love to see just
what kind of nasties are floating around b/c of this war thing.


            T Velazquez
            MIT Aero/Astro
            [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 14:53:43 GMT
From: elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!freedom!xanth![e-mail]  (Jonathan McDowell)
Subject: Jonathan's Space Report, Apr 2


Jonathan's Space Report

Apr 2 1991 (no.69)
----------------------------------------------------

Launch of STS-37/Atlantis and the Gamma Ray Observatory
remains due for April 5. Atlantis is on pad LC39B.

Viktor Afanas'ev and Musa Manarov continue in orbit aboard the
Mir/Kvant/Kvant-2/Kristall/Soyuz TM-11/Progress M-7 complex.
The Progress M-6 cargo craft undocked on Mar 15 and reentered.
Progress M-7 was launched on Mar 19 and docked on Mar 28 at
the third attempt. This is the first time that a Progress has
had an aborted docking; it got within 100m on Mar 22 and missed;
another attempt failed on Mar 23.
The Progress cargo craft is based on the Soyuz design.

Kosmos-2136 landed on Mar 20 after a standard 2 week
Vostok class recon mission.

Kosmos-2137 was launched on Mar 19 by a Kosmos/R-14 rocket
into a 449x494 km orbit inclined 65.8 degrees. This orbit
marks it as one of a rare class of small spacecraft
believed to be doing radar calibration or surveillance
work; it is the fourth in a series launched from 1979 onwards.

MLF1    Kosmos-1146       1979 Dec  5            444x494x65.9
MLF2    Kosmos-1427       1982 Dec 29            445x499x65.8
MLF3    Kosmos-1615       1984 Dec 22            453x512x65.8
MLF4    Kosmos-2137       1991 Mar 19            449x494x65.8

Kosmos-2138 was launched on Mar 26 by Soyuz from Plesetsk.
It is a recon satellite carrying a number of film return capsules
and will stay in orbit for 2 months.

A Nadezhda navigation/search and rescue satellite was launched
by Kosmos/R-14 on Mar 12. The Kospas search and rescue transponder is
similar to ones carried on US NOAA weather satellites.
Nadezhda satellites launched to date:

NE9    Kosmos-1383       1982    Jun 29    (Kospas)    991x1029x83
NE10    Kosmos-1447       1983 Mar 24    (Kospas)    961x1015x83
NE13    Kosmos-1574       1984    Jun 21    (Kospas)    971x1010x83
NE19    Nadezhda       1989 Jul  4    (Kospas)    960x1013x83
NE20    Nadezhda       1990 Feb 27    (Kospas)    938x1003x83
NE22    Nadezhda       1991    Mar 12  (Kospas)    958x1017x83

The 40-th Molniya-3 C-band comsat was launched from Plesetsk
on Mar 22. The Molniya launch vehicle is a Soyuz booster with
an extra Blok-L fourth stage.

___________________________________
|Current STS status:              |
|Orbiters                         |
|                                 |
|OV-102 Columbia        OPF Bay 1 |
|OV-103 Discovery       OPF Bay 2 |
|OV-104 Atlantis        LC39B     |
|                                 |
|ML/ET/SRB stacks                 |
|                                 |
|ML1/STS-37/ET/OV-104   LC39B     |
|ML2/STS-39/ET          VAB Bay 1 |
|ML3/STS-40             VAB Bay 3 |
-----------------------------------

10 years ago:  22-30 Mar 1981  Soyuz-39 carried out a week long
mission to the Salyut-6 space station. Commander was Vladimir
Dzhanibekov and researcher was the Mongolian cosmonaut
Jugderdemidyn Gurragcha, who we had lots of fun learning to pronounce.

20 years ago:  1 Apr 1971  The Canadian/US ISIS 2 ionospheric studies
satellite was launched. It transmitted until 1984. Also, the Soviet
Kosmos-402 spacecraft tested the nuclear reactor powered ocean surveillance
spacecraft bus.

30 years ago: 25 Mar 1961. NASA's Explorer 10 probe studied the
outer magnetosphere; and Korabl'-Sputnik-5 carried out the final
unpiloted 1-orbit test flight of the Vostok spaceship.

(c) 1991 Jonathan McDowell. Information in this report is obtained
from public sources and does not reflect the official views of NASA.

 .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
 |  Jonathan McDowell                 |  phone : [phone]                 |
 |  Space Science Lab ES65            | uucp:                                  |
 |  NASA Marshall Space Flight Center | bitnet :                               |
 |  Huntsville AL 35812               |  inter : [e-mail]  |
 |  USA                               |   span : ssl::mcdowell                 |
 '-----------------------------------------------------------------------------'

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 18:21:32 GMT
From: infonode![e-mail]  (Jeff W. Hyche)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Rockets


    With all this talk on nuclear rockets, what ever happened to
plains for a Daetualus style engine?
--
                                  // Jeff Hyche
    There can be only one!    \\ //  Usenet: [e-mail]
                               \X/   Freenet: [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 19:01:01 GMT
From: ucivax![e-mail]  (Rene Schaad)
Subject: At what time and date does the shuttle Atlantis land ?


I know that the shuttle is supposed to land at Edwards AFB on wednesday.
But when exactly? I would be glad if someone knowing the time could
post it here.

rene schaad
--
Rene Schaad
Theoretical Neurobiology Facility, UC Irvine, California
[e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 8 Apr 91 16:18:06 GMT
From: mcsun!inesc!unl!unl![e-mail]  (Jose Pina Coelho)
Subject: Re: Fred on the Moon


In article <[e-mail]>
[e-mail] (Tom McWilliams) writes:

>   I think it sounds like a great idea.  Other Advantages:
>
>   Radio telescopes; far side:  No interference from microwaves, tv, etc
>   Interferometry;   base line of 450000km possible
>   (one on earth, one on moon)
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ And how do they compare the data ?
From the far site it is *hard* to see earth

>   Space Telescope; All the advantages of atmospherelessness and no drawbacks,
>             like frequent temp changes and oscillations.

They don't need to be frequent, they just need to be the direct
irradiation to space alternated every 14 days with direct sunlight
(And I think you'll have to re-calibrate the whole thing every 14
days.)

>   Inter planetary launches;  even better speeds than the equator, not to mention
>                  the lower energy to escape.

That's not Fred, that's a FULL moon colony with the capacity to
produce fuel and rocket's etc ...

>   Skylab syndrome solved.  Can't deorbit, even with launch ability halted for
>                a decade by omni-ovo-mono-basketness
>   Tourism?  I'd like to go.  I'm sure someone that could afford it would, too.
You'd like to go ? I'd kill to go.
People that can afford it, can't afford the time for tourism.


>   BEST REASON:   We'd be on our way to building a Mining/Production/Energy-
>          harvesting Space Infrastructure.

WORST REASON:
Emergency: 3 days to get some kind of assistance from earth. (Assuming
something as energetic as a saturn V is fueled and on launch pad)


>   Anyone have any idea how this would be recieved by those making the decisions?
Badly, it's a many billion-dollar project, which means higher taxes
(or no money for the military), and less votes (which, as we all know,
is a definitive no-no).

--
Jose Pedro T. Pina Coelho   | BITNET/Internet: [e-mail]
Rua Jau N 1, 2 Dto          | UUCP: ...!mcsun!unl!jpc
1300 Lisboa, PORTUGAL       | Home phone: (+351) (1) 640767

- If all men were brothers, would you let one marry your sister ?

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V13 #377
*******************