Pegasus XL failure investigation confirms, as expected, that the problem was faulty assumptions in the aerodynamic model, and recommends a revised model incorporating wind-tunnel data. Second XL flight tentatively set for late this year.
Russia launches a new imaging spysat on a Zenit, first use of this booster for such a mission. Cosmos 2290 appears to be an advanced sixth-generation bird using both film pods and digital transmission.
Lockheed and Martin Marietta to merge, creating a company bigger than even Boeing. Norman Augustine (of MM) will be president of Lockheed Martin; Daniel Tellep (Lockheed) will be chairman and CEO. The two companies are nearly equal in size. Antitrust scrutiny will be close because of the sheer size of the deal, but serious problems are not expected. The Pentagon is not expecting large cost savings to it as a result, although it's hoping for small ones due to reduced overhead.
LM will be very strong in the commercial launch market, starting at the low end with LLV, moving up through Atlas and Titan, and finishing at the high end with Proton. Satellite operators are very interested in seeing some effective competition for Arianespace, but they caution that LM has a lot to learn about commercial marketing, especially on the M side.
Titan IV launch successful 27 Aug, 91 days after rollout to the pad (which may not sound impressive, but it's a lot better than previous T-IVs), despite the need to repair plumbing damage caused by the previous launch in May.
H-2 launch successful 28 Aug, delivering ETS-6 (aka Kiku-6) to GTO. Alas, all did not go well for the experimental comsat thereafter. Apogee-motor firing was delayed due to an erroneous attitude-control command... and when it was finally tried, a "pre-firing" was normal, but the main firing on the 31st produced only about 10% of the design thrust. A fuel valve had stuck open, and the apogee motor was useless. ETS-6 is stranded in a largely-useless orbit passing through the Van Allen belts regularly, and NASDA's biggest-ever satellite project is basically down the tubes. Masato Yamano (NASDA's director) made a public apology to the taxpayers.
Russian ground controllers are trying to sort out a serious problem: the Progress M-24 freighter has made two unsuccessful attempts to dock with Mir, each time failing due to attitude misalignment. A third attempt is imminent; there is some question of whether fuel would be adequate for a fourth. If docking cannot be done, it may be necessary to evacuate the Mir crew within a few weeks, before they run out of supplies. The worst problem right now is that very little is known about the cause of the failures. A further complication is that the Progress appears to have bumped Mir on the second attempt.
This is doubly embarrassing for the Russians because this Progress is carrying various items of Western equipment, some of it crucial to Ulf Merbold's Euromir mission in October, and other items related to US/Russian work on Mir.
Two options are being examined for a third docking attempt. First, since the problems seem to set in at about 10m separation, there is a proposal to just shut down Progress's guidance system at that point, on the theory that alignment achieved before then should be good enough for the Progress to coast in. Second, there is an option to remotely pilot Progress from Mir using a radio link, and the current Mir commander (Yuri Malenschenko) has trained for this... although it's never been tried for real.
The USAF is trying to keep its current aircraft programs alive and on track by finding money to cut elsewhere, and proposals for cuts have included vague references to "excess space launch capacity". [Maybe they're going to tell the NRO that if it wants Titan IV, it can start paying for it?]
USAF Air University announces completion of its "SPACECAST 2020" study of future military spaceflight requirements. The full report is still being reviewed, but items of note appear to include:
The success of arcjet stationkeeping thrusters on the recent Telstar 4 series has gotten them onto at least three new comsat series: Intelsat 8, Asiasat, and Echostar.
The EUVE folks are planning a slightly daring experiment: on 1 Nov, EUVE's control center in Berkeley will run unmanned for 14 hours, with only the computers watching the satellite.
Vimpel International Corp. of Russia proposes a set of 2-3 very large phased-array radars at near-equatorial locations to track and catalog space debris as small as 1cm at 1000km altitude.
Discovery launch imminent, with primary payloads including Lite (a lidar system exploring orbital remote-sensing technology), Spartan 201 (small free-flyer carrying two solar telescopes), Safer (an emergency-rescue pack for EVA astronauts), and Spifex (a plume-sensing payload that will be held out on the arm while orbiter thrusters are fired, to evaluate effects on nearby structures such as space-station solar arrays).
The big PR item on this one is Safer, designed to return a spacewalker who is adrift due to tether failure or other problems. Shuttle spacewalkers can always be retrieved by the orbiter if all else fails, but this option will not be available on the space station, or for that matter during Shuttle/Mir operations. The Safer tests will be done untethered, the first untethered EVAs since the MMU flights in the mid-1980s. (The MMUs have been mothballed because they aren't very useful.) Initial tests will evaluate performance and control, after which rescue simulations will include having the astronaut on the arm (Carl Meade) spin the Safer astronaut (Mark Lee) and then back off to see if he can recover. Finally, Lee will try to fly the length of the arm and then make a precision approach to the airlock.
Interview with Goldin in which he sets out his view of development of next-generation launchers (among other things). He doesn't think NASA can fund another big launcher program, but it can and should do risk-reduction work to make such a project more attractive to industry, and perhaps act as an anchor tenant "at a fair price, not a subsidized price". "We have too much government in the Shuttle. We need it now because that's the way the program was set up, but what if we were to just buy a launch?"
Justice for groups that doesn't include justice | Henry Spencer for individuals is a mockery. | henry@zoo.toronto.edu