All Space articles – Page 201
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NASA delays X-34 first flight
The first flight of the Orbital Sciences X-34 air-launched re-usable spaceplane technology demonstrator has been delayed from December 1998 to March 1999. NASA has also ordered a second X-34 to reduce risk and increase project flexibility. The test objectives of the $67 million programme are also being expanded. The ...
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Launching services
The Russian Space Agency and national company STC Komplex have established Launching Services, a company which is dedicated to providing transportation services for small satellites to low-Earth orbit, using Cosmos and Start boosters from the Plesetsk and Svobodny cosmodromes. Source: Flight International
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Giant leaps for Deltas
Tim Furniss/CAPE CANAVERAL Boeing is preparing launch pad 17B at Cape Canaveral, Florida, for the first launch of the Delta III booster in June. The company is also expecting an Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) contract from the US Air Force in June to start development of the new ...
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Shuttle tank heads for May debut
The first lightweight Space Shuttle external tank has arrived at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida to be prepared for its first flight on the STS91/ Discovery mission, to make the ninth docking at the Russian Mir space station in May. The aluminium lithium tank, which holds the cryogenic liquid ...
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Russia seeks $6.2 billion for International Space Station
Tim Furniss/LONDON Russia will need $6.2 billion funding over the next ten years to build and maintain its component of the International Space Station (ISS), according to Russian Space Agency (RSA) director Yuri Koptev. Some $3 billion will be spent on construction, with the remainder going on maintenance, he says. ...
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Work halts on manned missions
Tim Furniss/LONDON Work at NASA on advanced planning for potential manned Moon and Mars missions has been stopped. Budget difficulties and anticipated future budget restraint have made it obvious to the agency that nearer-term goals must take priority. NASA centres, including the Advanced Projects office at Houston, Texas, ...
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Going with the flow
Tim Furniss/KENNEDY SPACE CENTER With six International Space Station (ISS) assembly missions scheduled for 1999, and 18 more due to take place between 2000 and 2002, NASA's Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, is soon going to be a hive of activity. The Photovoltaic Module ...
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Spacecraft explores Earth
This image of the Earth's South Pole and part of South America was taken at a distance of about 640km by NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft. The photograph demonstrates the craft's charged-coupled device imager, which was used when the vehicle was flying past the planet at a ...
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Israel's Shavit booster suffers a second failure
The Failure of the Shavit booster on 22 January, with the loss of the Ofeq 4 spy satellite, was the second of five Israeli launches which has failed to put a satellite into orbit. The three-stage booster, based on the two-stage Jericho 2 missile, was first flown in 1988 ...
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Early Bird remote sensor is lost four days after launch
US company EarthWatch has conceded that its first commercial remote-sensing satellite, the Early Bird, has been lost. The spacecraft, built by CTA, now part of Orbital Sciences, was launched into a 470km polar orbit by a Start 1 booster from the Svobodny Cosmodrome in far-east Russia on 24 December. ...
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Glenn confirmed
The flight of 77-year-old John Glenn - the USA's first man in orbit in February 1962 - as a payload specialist aboard the Space Shuttle STS95/Discovery in October, has been confirmed by NASA. The STS95 will also feature a reflight of the Spartan free-flying satellite, which was lost, then retrieved, ...
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Lunar Orbiter
NASA'S Lunar Prospector has entered its 100km circular polar orbit around the Moon. The Lockheed Martin-built, 295kg Discovery-series craft, which was launched on 6 January, will be used to conduct an intensive one-year survey of the Moon. It will use five instruments. Source: Flight International
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Space station project moves on as FGB goes to Baikonur
Tim Furniss/LONDON The International Space Station (ISS) project reached an important point on 17 January, with the roll-out and shipment to the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan of the Functional Cargo Block (FGB) module. Launch of the system by a Proton booster is due on 30 June. The lift-off will mark ...
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MMS to build second adaptor for Delta II
Matra Marconi Space (MMS) has won a contract from Boeing to build a second dual-payload-attach fitting (DPAF) for the Delta II satellite launcher. The DPAFs, which will provide the Delta II with dual-launch capability to low-Earth orbit for payloads up to 2,250kg, will be used first for a launch ...
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Mars fever
Tim Furniss/LONDON The first flights to enable assembly of the International Space Station (ISS) to begin are scheduled to start in June, but such is the intense public interest in Mars after the Mars Pathfinder mission in 1997 that NASA is considering a more Martian-orientated approach to the later stages ...
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Arianespace looks to halve Ariane 5 price
Julian Moxon/PARIS Arianespace is looking for cuts of up to 50% in the purchase price of its new Ariane 5 as part of its planned production order for up to 50 launchers. "We will negotiate the deal based on our cost-reduction objectives," says president, Jean-Marie Luton. The contract would ...
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Enhanced Skynet 4 launched
Tim Furniss/CAPE CANAVERAL The UK's Skynet 4D military-communications satellite was lofted into orbit by a three-stage Boeing Delta 2 booster from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 10 January. The launch was the first of 18 planned by the Delta this year and the first of 11 Matra Marconi Space ...
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Going private
Tim Furniss/LONDON Thirty-seven years ago, a US Lockheed U-2 spy plane was shot down for flying over the former Soviet Union's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, where the Space Age began with the launch of the Sputnik 1 on 4 October, 1957. Now the Cosmodrome is going private and very public. ...
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Kelly Space completes Eclipse tow-launcher demonstration
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELES Kelly Space & Technology (KST) has completed the first large-scale demonstration of its "Eclipse" tow-launch technique at Edwards AFB, California using a US Air Force-supplied Lockheed C-141A and QF-106A. KST is developing a family of low-cost re-usable space launchers which will use the Eclipse technique ...
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First Mars soil samples to be collected
NASA's plans for the Mars Surveyor Orbiter 2 and Lander 2 missions, to be launched in 2001, include the collection of the first samples of Martian soil to be brought back to Earth on a later mission. The Orbiter 2 and Lander 2 missions will follow the Mars Surveyor Orbiter ...