SPACEWARN Activities

2005-023A

Express-AM3 is a Russian geostationary communications satellite that was launched by a Proton-K rocket from Baikonur at 20:41 UT on 24 June 2005. The 2.5 tonne satellite carries 16 C-band, 12 Ku-band, and a single L-band transponders to provide video and radio transmissions to all of Russia after parking over 140°E longitude. The Express-AM fleet is replacing the aging fleets of Gorizont and Ekron-M.

2005-022A

Intelsat Americas 8 (also known as IA 8) is an American (Bermuda registered) geostationary satellite that was launched by a Zenit 3SL rocket from Odyssey, the platform floating on the equatorial Pacific Ocean at 154°W longitude, at 15:03 UT on 23 June 2005. The 5.5 tonne, 16 kW satellite carries 28 C-, 36 Ku-, and 24 Ka-band transponders to provide video and data transmissions to all countries in North and South America, after parking over 89°W longitude. It will be the 28^th satellite in the Intelsat fleet.

2005-021A

Progress-M 53 is a Russian automatic cargo craft that was launched at 23:09 UT on 16 June 2005 by a Soyuz-U rocket from Baikonur. The craft carried 2.5 tonnes of food, water, fuel, and supplies to the International Space Station (ISS). It docked with the Zvezda module of the ISS "manually" (after a glitch in a communications link) at 00:44 UT on 18 June, with commands from the Russian astronaut on-board the ISS. In anticipation of the docking, the previously docked Progress-M 52, carrying over a tonne of garbage from the station, was evicted from its port to deorbit into the Pacific Ocean. The initial orbital parameters of Progress-M 53 were period 91 min, apogee 353 km, perigee 351 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 (2005)

1976-022B (08745)   R/B that launched COSMOS 897     28 June
2005-020B (28687)   R/B Soyuz-U                      24 June
2005-001C (28519)   R/B(1) Delta 2                   20 June
2005-021B (28701)   R/B Soyuz-U                      19 June
1971-003A (04849)   METEOR 1-7                       14 June

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 or data that are entered on occasion and may not be repeated in each issue of the SPACEWARN Bulletin.

Date: Fri, 24 Jun 2005 09:41:09 +0900
From: makita 
To: grayzeck@mail630.gsfc.nasa.gov
Subject: Pre-launch Announcement 33821

05/0040UT JUNE 23
FM NICT(OLD:CRL) KOKUBUNJI JAPAN 232611 DENPA J
TO COSPAR/ISES

SPACEWARN 33821

Pre-launch Announcement

1. Spacecraft Name     ASTRO-EII
2. Planned Launch Date     July 6, 2005
3. Country                 Japan
4. Orbit Type              Near circular orbit
5. Perigee                 approx. 2560km (just after the orbit
                             injection just after entering an orbit)
                             The altitude of  orbit, its perigee
                             will be maneuvered up to about 550 km.
6. Apogee                  approx. 550 km
7. Inclination             approx. 32   degrees
8. Orbit Period            approx. 1  h  33 m
9. Mission Life            about 3 years
10. Launch Organization    JAXA
11. Spacecraft Missions    Observations of cosmic X-ray sources
                             International space observatory

Mr. Yoshiyuki Makita
Chief, Science and Technology Information Group
Research Support Division, General Affairs Department
National Institute of Information and Communications Technology
(Address: 4-2-1,Nukui-Kita,Koganei City,Tokyo 184-8795,Japan)
(E-mail: makita@nict.go.jp)
(tel: +81-42-327-6846 or +81-42-327-6094)
(fax: +81-42-327-7603)
  

A Russian-American satellite named Cosmos 1 was launched from a Russian submarine in the Barents Sea on 21 June 2005 by a modified ICBM. The 103 kg satellite was equipped with eight triangular sails of side 15 m that would navigate the satellite by solar radiation pressure alone. However, the satellite crashed soon after, and some debris were later located in the sea.

A Russian Molniya-M rocket, carrying a military satellite, was launched from Plesetsk at 00:49 UT on 21 June 2005. The rocket crashed in Siberia soon after lift-off.

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/