Tag Archives: launch

Apollo Boilerplate Mission: Micrometeoroid Detection

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Forty-five years ago today — February 16, 1965 — the Apollo boilerplate mission SA-9 launched from Cape Canaveral. The Saturn-I booster carried a “boilerplate” Apollo capsule and tried out elements of the Apollo launch sequence, but also carried its first live payload: the Pegasus-1 micrometeoroid detection satellite.


(Wernher von Braun in front of a Saturn-IB rocket, 1968. NASA image.)

The Pegasus-1 spacecraft was equipped with large wings — 29.3 x 4.3 meters, nearly 100 feet by 14 — that detected impacts by micrometeoroids in the flight regime through which Apollo astronauts would fly on their way to the Moon. This Wikipedia page has more information on the Pegasus itself.

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Valentine's Day Space History: Solar Max, and a Near-Earth Asteroid

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Thirty years ago today — February 14, 1980 — a Delta rocket out of Cape Canaveral launched the Solar Maximum Mission to study the Sun during the peak of the 11-year solar cycle.


(The SMM spacecraft in orbit. NASA image.)

The SMM satellite malfunctioned in January 1981, but in April 1984 it was recovered by the space shuttle Challenger and serviced in orbit. After it was released, it continued functioning until it reentered the Earth’s atmosphere in December 1989.


(The SMM satellite being repaired in the shuttle cargo bay. NASA image.)

And 10 years ago, on Valentine’s Day 2000, the NEAR spacecraft — Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous, also known as “NEAR Shoemaker” in honor of astronomer Eugene Shoemaker — entered orbit around the asteroid Eros. NEAR studied Eros for a year before landing on the asteroid in February 2001.

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Japan Joins the Space Club, Endeavour Scans the Earth

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Forty years ago today — February 11, 1970 — Japan launched its first satellite, Ohsumi, from the Uchinoura Space Center. Ohsumi was a small technology demonstrator, with only a few instruments on board, but its success made Japan only the fourth nation (after the U.S.S.R, the U.S.A., and France) to successfully place a payload in orbit.

Thirty years later, in 2000, Japanese astronaut Mamoru Mohri launched into orbit aboard Space Shuttle Endeavour on mission STS-99, his second spaceflight. Mohri joined U.S. astronauts Kevin R. Kregel, Dominic L. Pudwill Gorie, Janet L. Kavandi, and Janice E. Voss, as well as Gerhard P. J. Thiele of Germany, on the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM).


(SRTM in the shuttle cargo bay. NASA image.)

Over its 11-day mission, the SRTM mapped over 99% of the earth’s land area between 60 degrees N latitude and 56 degrees S latitude. The SRTM instrument consisted of a large radar array in the shuttle cargo bay and a smaller antenna mounted on an extendable mast: the mast, the longest rigid structure yet flown in space, placed the secondary antenna 200 feet (60 meters) outside the shuttle. The configuration caused an increase in fuel consumption as the shuttle had to “offset the gravity gradient torque of the mast,” but they were able to compensate and complete the mapping mission.

Endeavour is in orbit today on mission STS-130, its next-to-last mission to the International Space Station. Fare thee well.

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DISCOVERY Launches on First DoD Shuttle Mission

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Twenty-five years ago today — January 24, 1985, the Space Shuttle Discovery launched from Kennedy Space Center on mission STS-51C.


(Launch of mission STS-51C. NASA image.)

The crew — Thomas K. Mattingly, Loren J. Shriver, Ellison S. Onizuka, James F. Buchli and Gary E. Payton — used an Air Force Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) booster to place a classified Department of Defense satellite in orbit, making this the first dedicated DoD mission.

Space enthusiasts will recognize some of those astronauts’ names. Many know that Ken Mattingly, for instance, was originally scheduled to fly on the Apollo-13 mission; he later flew as the Command Module pilot for Apollo-16 and the mission commander for STS-4, the fourth space shuttle orbital test flight. And many will recognize Ellison Onizuka as one of the astronauts who died in the Challenger explosion in 1986.

My personal connection to this flight, however, is Gary Payton. He’s been the Deputy Under Secretary of the Air Force for Space Programs since 2005, and I worked with him when I was writing speeches for the Under Secretary, Dr. Sega. I found Mr. Payton to be a terrific person, extremely smart and talented.

As I said in my retirement speech, if I couldn’t be an astronaut, at least I got to work with a few of them.

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Our Geeky Church, and a Little Space History

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Before we get into today’s space history, a “quote of the day” from last night’s small group Bible study. As we were gathering, Maria grabbed one of our STAR TREK coffee mugs for Elliott, so I mentioned that ReConStruction, the North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFic) is coming to Raleigh in August. True to the nature of our science fiction church, Elliott said, “If that’s not a church trip, I don’t know what is!”

Yes, we’re geeks. But you already knew that, didn’t you?

Back to the topic at hand, an interesting launch 40 years ago in space history. On January 23, 1970, a Delta rocket out of Vandenberg AFB carried two satellites, ITOS-1 and Oscar-5.

ITOS-1 was the first prototype of the “Improved TIROS Operational System” — that is, a new and improved version of the remote sensing satellite featured in yesterday’s space history item. ITOS-1 was built “to provide improved operational infrared and visual observations of earth cloud cover for use in weather analysis and forecasting.”

Oscar-5, on the other hand, was an amateur spacecraft built by students at the University of Melbourne, Australia. It has the distinction of being the first remotely-controlled amateur micro-satellite.

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Remote Sensing, 60s- 70s-Style

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Forty-five years ago today — January 22, 1965 — the Tiros-9 satellite was launched from Cape Canaveral atop a Delta rocket.

(Tiros satellite. Lockheed Martin image from JPL Mission & Spacecraft Library. Click to enlarge.)

Tiros-9 was the first of the Television Infrared Observation Satellite (TIROS) series to be launched into a polar orbit. Intended for a sun-synchronous orbit, it ended up in a highly elliptical orbit due to a failure in the onboard guidance system. Tiros-9 was also the first meteorological satellite to operate in a “cartwheel” fashion in which the “spacecraft spin axis was maintained normal to the orbital plane” by means of electromagnetic torque between an electrical circuit loop in the vehicle and the earth’s magnetic field. Tiros-9 suffered a series of system failures and ultimately retired from service in February 1967.

Ten years after Tiros-9, and on the other side of the continent, Landsat-2 — another remote sensing spacecraft — launched from Vandenberg AFB. Landsat-2 also launched on a Delta rocket. As proof of how much had been learned about spacecraft design in the interim, Landsat-2 remained operational over three times as long as Tiros-9: it retired from service in February 1982.

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Mercury Abort Test, 50 Years Ago

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First off, thanks to everybody who commented on the space history quasi-series, whether here, on Twitter, or on Facebook. (I got no LinkedIn comments, but it isn’t quite as convenient for communicating.) I appreciate the feedback!

Now, for today’s entry …

A half-century ago today (which is hard to write because I’m getting closer to that age every day) — January 21, 1960 — NASA launched the Little Joe 1B test vehicle from Wallops Island, VA.


(Little Joe 1B launch. NASA image.)

Like the Little Joe 2 launch a few weeks before,* which I blogged about here, this test of the Mercury abort system carried a rhesus monkey. In this case, the passenger was “Miss Sam,” the mate of “Sam” who had flown on the previous launch.


(“Miss Sam” in her protective couch, prior to the Little Joe 1B launch. NASA image from Wikimedia Commons.)

“Miss Sam”‘s launch only placed her about 9 miles in altitude, however, so she did not earn her astronaut wings.

For a fascinating history of animals (especially monkeys!) in space, check out this NASA page.

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*The Little Joe launches were not in numerical order, for some reason.

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Gemini Testing

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No, it’s not testing twins or the veracity of astrological predictions: 45 years ago today — January 19, 1965 — a Titan-II rocket launched from Cape Canaveral in the second suborbital, unmanned test of the Titan launch vehicle and the Gemini spacecraft.

(Gemini-2 capsule, displayed at the Air Force Space & Missile Museum. Public domain image from Wikipedia. Click to enlarge.)

The Wikipedia entry on the Gemini-2 test flight includes some interesting facts:

  • The vehicle was used as a pathfinder for Gemini flight crew preparation
  • Shortly after launch, the mission control center lost power because the network television equipment overloaded the electrical system
  • The Gemini-2 reentry module was refurbished and launched on a Titan IIIC on November 3, 1966, as a test flight for the USAF’s Manned Orbiting Laboratory program

[BREAK, BREAK]

Out of curiosity, what do you think of these occasional space history items? I’ve had fun posting them, but I wonder if anyone else cares. If you like them, or if you don’t, let me know with a comment, an e-mail, or a note on Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn.

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Deep Impact (the Launch)

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Five years ago today — January 12, 2005 — the Deep Impact probe launched atop a Delta 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral, on its way to a rendezvous with comet Tempel 1.


(Deep Impact launch. Kennedy Space Center/Elizabeth Warner photo, from NASA/University of Maryland mission site.)

The spacecraft flew by the comet on July 4, 2005, and released an “impactor” that struck the comet to help determine its composition. (More on that when that anniversary comes around.)

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First Japanese Deep Space Mission: Halley's Comet

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Twenty-five years ago today — January 7, 1985* — an M-3SII launch vehicle took off from Japan’s Uchinoura (formerly Kagoshima) Space Center carrying the Sakigake spacecraft toward Halley’s Comet.


(Sakigake spacecraft. Image from NASA’s Space Science Data Center.)

Sakigake means “pioneer,” and this spacecraft was actually a pathfinder for the Suisei spacecraft launched eight months later.

Sakigake’s main role was to provide a distant reference point to help scientists interpret data sent from probes that flew much closer to the nucleus of the comet. Sakigake’s closest approach to comet Halley was 7 million km (about 4.4 million miles).

Additional comet encounters were planned for the Sakigake spacecraft, but it depleted its hydrazine propellant and finally telemetry from the vehicle was lost in November 1995.

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*For us here in the U.S.; it was already January 8th in Japan.

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