SPACEWARN Activities

2004-043A

Express-AM1 is a Russian geostationary communications satellite that was launched by a Proton-M rocket from Baikonur at 22:11 UT on 29 October 2004. It will provide digital TV, radio broadcasting, video-conference, and wide-band internet services to most of Russia. Parking longitude is not available at this time.

2004-042A

Fengyun 2C is a Chinese (PRC) geostationary weather satellite that was launched by a Long March 3A rocket from Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan province at "09:30 a.m." (probably 01:30 UT) on 19 October 2004. The 1.38 tonne satellite carries imagers in visible and infra-red bands to monitor droplet sizes on cloud tops, ocean temperature, dust storms and forest fires over one-third of the global surface, after parking over 105° E longitude.

2004-041A

AMC 15, also known as AMERICOM 15 is an American geostationary communications satellite that was launched by a Proton-M rocket from Baikonur at 21:23 UT on 14 October 2004. The 4.05 tonne satellite carries 24 Ku-band transponders and 12 spot-beam, Ka-band transponders to provide direct-to-home video, voice, and internet services to North America after parking over 105° W longitude.

2004-040A

Soyuz-TMA 5 is a Russian automatic passenger transportation craft that was launched by a Soyuz-U rocket from Bailkonur at 03:06 UT on 14 October 2004. It carried two Russian and one American astronaut to the International Space Station (ISS). It docked with the PIRS module of the ISS at 04:25 UT on 16 October with manual control by the commander after it was determined to be approaching the ISS at an excessive speed. Two of the astronauts will spend a six-month residency at the station. The third, along with the two astronauts who had spent six months in ISS soft-landed on 24 October in Russia on the Soyuz-TMA 4 which had remained docked for six months. The initial orbital parameters of TMA 5 were period 87.1 min, apogee 367 km, perigee 355 km, and inclination 51.6°.

Spacecraft with essentially continuous radio beacons on frequencies less than 150 MHz, or higher frequencies if especially suited for ionospheric or geodetic studies.

NNSS denotes U.S. Navy Navigational Satellite System. Updates or corrections to the list are possible only with information from the user community.

Note: The full list appeared in SPX 545. The list will not be repeated in future issues until significantly revised again.

Global Positioning System satellites useful for navigational purposes and geodetic studies.

High precision (<20 cm) GPS constellation tracking data obtained from the network of about 400 dedicated global stations that are of interest to geodetic study may be obtained through the following services provided by the International GNSS Service (IGS). The IGS is a service of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG).

     FTP:    igscb.jpl.nasa.gov  [directory /igscb]
     WWW:    http://igscb.jpl.nasa.gov/
     E-mail: igscb@cobra.jpl.nasa.gov

The standard format of the GPS situation appeared in SPACEWARN Bulletin No. 518. It will not be repeated since an excellent source of trajectory- and science-related GPS information is at:

http://www.colorado.edu/geography/gcraft/notes/gps/gps_f.html

It provides many links to GPS related databases.

The latest addition to the fleet is Navstar 54, 2004-009A.

Russian Global Navigational (Positioning) Spacecraft, GLONASS constellation.

SPACEWARN requests updates/additions from readers to this list.

All GLONASS spacecraft are in the general Cosmos series. The Cosmos numbers invoked by USSPACECOM have often differed from the numbers (NNNN) associated in Russia; when different, the USSPACECOM Cosmos numbers are shown in parentheses. The corresponding GLONASS numbers are Russian numbers, followed by the numbers in parentheses that are sometimes attributed to them outside Russia.

The operating frequencies in MHz are computed from the channel number K. Frequencies (MHz) = 1602.0 + 0.5625K and L2 = 1246.0 + 0.4375K.

The standard format of the GLONASS situation last appeared in SPACEWARN Bulletin No. 545. It will not be repeated in view of the excellent updated source at: http://www.glonass-ianc.rsa.ru/ maintained by the Information-Analytical Center (IAC), Russian Space Agency.

Visually bright objects.

See http://www.space-track.org/perl/bulk_files.pl. Users must register. Conditions apply.

Actual decays/landings of payload spacecraft and rocket bodies (R/B) only. No further information is available.

Designations         Common Name                  Decay Date (2004)

2004-013A (28228)  SOYUZ-TMA 4                       24 October
2004-010E (28197)  R/B (Aux.Mot) Proton-K            11 October
2004-039B (28425)  R/B Long March 2D                 10 October
1991-053A (21630)  MOLNIYA 1-82                      09 October
2004-026B (28377)  R/B Delta 2                       23 September

60-day Decay Predictions.

See http://www.space-track.org/perl/60day_decay_predict.pl. Users must register for access. Conditions apply

Miscellaneous Items.

This section contains information/data that are entered on occasion and may not be repeated in each issue of the SPACEWARN Bulletin.

The FSW 3 satellite (2004-039A) has been renamed FSW-3 3.

Related NSSDC resources.

NSSDC/WDC for Satellite Information is an archival center for science data from many spacecraft. Many space physics datasets are on-line for electronic access through:
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/space/

For off-line data, please contact the Request Office, NSSDC, Code 690.1, NASA GSFC, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771, U.S.A., for specific information (nssdc-request@listserv.gsfc.nasa.gov). Information on the current status of the instruments on board from the investigators will be most welcomed. Precomputed trajectory files and orbital parameters of many magnetospheric and heliospheric science-payload spacecraft may be obtained from:
http://nssdcftp.gsfc.nasa.gov/miscellaneous/orbits/

Other files of interest for Earth-centered spacecraft can be generated via the URL,
http://sscweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Programs related to the heliospheric spacecraft trajectories can be executed through the URL:
http://cohoweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/helios/heli.html

Magnetospheric, Planetary, and Astronomical science data from many spacecraft may be accessed through links from the URL:
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/