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Архив RU.SPACE.NEWS за 23 января 1998

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: This Week on Galileo - January 19-25, 1998 Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... THIS WEEK ON GALILEO January 19-25, 1998 The Galileo spacecraft has resumed transmitting pictures and science data to Earth at normal speed. Transmission of the data, which is stored on board the spacecraft, had been slowed down by two incidents of anomalous behavior by Galileo's attitude control system. The anomalies had caused the spacecraft's radio antenna to be aimed 10 degrees from Earth. However, the spacecraft successfully completed a turn that pointed its antenna within 3 degrees of Earth, which is a normal angle. The turn was performed early last week. The cause of the anomalous behavior in the spacecraft's attitude control subsystem remains unknown. The leading candidate continues to be one of the spacecraft's two gyroscopes, but no definite evidence has been found as of today. The project has formed a team of hardware experts to continue analysis of the available engineering data. Scheduled for this week is the execution of the mission's next orbit trim maneuver. This maneuver was orginally scheduled for last week, but was delayed due to the anomalous behavior of the attitude control subsystem. Remember that these maneuvers are performed to keep the spacecraft traveling around Jupiter along the desired orbital path. The series of commands that will control the execution of this orbit trim maneuver will be built with additional safeguards. If the behavior of the attitude control subsystem becomes anomalous, these safeguards will prevent a reoccurance of any activity that would lead to undesireable spacecraft pointing. The science data processing and transmission schedule for this week focuses on two areas. Remaining on the schedule is the return of high time resolution fields and particles information of the interaction between Europa and Jupiter's magnetic and electric field environment. New to the schedule is a series of three observations taken by the spacecraft's Solid State imaging camera. These images show a region of Europa characterized by wedge shaped features which will provide information on how surface spreading or cracking may have occurred on Europa. The first will have an image resolution of 15 meters (49 feet) per picture element and, the second, 30 meters (98 feet) per picture element. Together these two observations are expected to allow the creation of a stereo image of this region. The third image is of slightly lower resolution and at 50 meters (164 feet) per picture element will provide regional context information for the previous two images. This region of Europa was also imaged during the Callisto-Orbit 3 encounter of Galileo's primary mission. For more information on the Galileo spacecraft and its mission to Jupiter, please visit the Galileo home page: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/ Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: Galileo Update - January 20, 1998 Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE JET PROPULSION LABORATORY CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011 http://www.jpl.nasa.gov Galileo Europa Mission Status January 20, 1998 Members of the Galileo flight team are analyzing data from a test performed Friday night, which they hope will shed light on the cause of two recent incidents of anomalous behavior by the spacecraft. While the investigation continues, the spacecraft has resumed normal transmission to Earth of pictures and other science information stored on its onboard tape recorder. While one anomaly occurred during the spacecraft's December 16, 1997 flyby of Europa, and the other after the flyby, both involved the attitude control subsystem, which controls where the spacecraft and scan platform are pointing. Team members suspect the cause may have been one of the spacecraft's two gyroscopes. The gyroscopes are used to point the spacecraft when very precise pointing control and knowledge of the spacecraft's position and orientation are needed, usually for camera and other remote sensing science observations or for maneuvers that adjust the spacecraft's flight path. The anomalies were not considered serious, but they did cause a temporary slowdown in the rate at which information was transmitted to Earth. That's because the anomalies caused Galileo's radio antenna to point in a direction about 10 degrees from Earth, about eight degrees greater than the normal attitude for ideal data transmission. However, information is now being transmitted at a normal rate once again, thanks to a spacecraft turn performed last week which pointed Galileo's antenna within 3 degrees of Earth, a normal angle. Galileo has begun sending back to Earth some high-resolution pictures taken during the Dec.16 Europa encounter. That flyby was the closest ever to be performed by Galileo, with the spacecraft dipping down to 200 kilometers (124 miles) above the icy moon's surface. This week, Galileo will also return fields and particles information on the interaction between Europa and Jupiter's magnetic and electric field environment. A flight path maneuver is planned for Thursday evening, Jan. 22 to prepare for Galileo's upcoming Europa encounter on Feb. 10. Special precautions have been taken in the design of this maneuver to minimize its vulnerability to any gyro problems. Because of its proximity to solar conjunction, when the Sun will be between Galileo and Earth, no data collection is planned except for radio science information. The spacecraft recently began a two-year extended mission, known as the Galileo Europa Mission, which will include a total of eight Europa flybys, four of Callisto, and one or two of Io, depending on spacecraft health. ##### Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: Additional Experiments Selected For Mars 2001 Missions Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... Michael Braukus Headquarters, Washington, DC January 22, 1998 (Phone: 202/358-1979) Douglas Isbell Headquarters, Washington, DC (Phone: 202/358-1753) RELEASE: 98-13 ADDITIONAL EXPERIMENTS SELECTED FOR MARS 2001 MISSIONS NASA has selected additional instruments for the Mars Surveyor 2001 missions, which will study Mars' environment. The Mars Surveyor 2001 missions will follow two other robotic Mars missions to be launched in late 1998 and early 1999. All are part of NASA's long-term, systematic exploration of Mars in which two missions are launched to the planet approximately every 26 months. "In a sense, these missions allow virtual presence by humans and provide precursor data and subsequent infrastructure for possible human missions in the 21st century," said Arnauld Nicogossian, Associate Administrator of NASA's Office of Life and Microgravity Sciences and Applications. "By adding capability to missions already planned, this near term effort will result in cost effective, tangible progress in carrying out the Human Exploration and Development of Space strategy and contribute to the Origins program of NASA's Office of Space Science." NASA's Office of Life and Microgravity Sciences and Applications has selected the following investigations for the Mars 2001 Orbiter, due for launch in March of that year, and the Mars 2001 Lander/Rover, due for launch in April 2001: * The Martian Radiation Environment Experiment will characterize the radiation environment in the orbit and on the surface of Mars simultaneously. This experiment will consist of radiation spectrometers on both the Mars 2001 Orbiter and on the Mars 2001 Lander. Dr. Guatam Badhwar from NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, is the principal investigator. * The Mars Environmental Compatibility Assessment will characterize Martian dust and soil to identify potential undesirable and harmful interactions with human explorers and associated hardware, and to evaluate properties of the soil related to its use as a construction material. Dr. Thomas Meloy from West Virginia State University is the principal investigator. A team consisting of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, CA, and Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, CO, will develop the missions, led by JPL. The radiation and dust investigations were selected from 39 proposals submitted to NASA in August 1997. Both of the 2001 missions are part of an ongoing NASA series of robotic Mars exploration spacecraft that began with the launches of the Mars Global Surveyor in November 1996. The 2001 missions represent the first step in a NASA initiative to integrate the requirements for Space Science and the Human Exploration and Development of Space program into a single robotic exploration program. - end - Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: MISSION TO PLANET EARTH ENTERPRISE NAME CHANGED TO EARTH SCIENCE Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... Douglas Isbell Headquarters, Washington, DC January 21, 1998 (Phone: 202/358-1753) RELEASE: 98-12 MISSION TO PLANET EARTH ENTERPRISE NAME CHANGED TO EARTH SCIENCE NASA has renamed the Mission to Planet Earth enterprise the Earth Science enterprise. The Earth Science enterprise is one of the four strategic enterprises of the Agency, responsible for a long-term, coordinated research effort to study the total Earth system and the effects of natural and human-induced changes on the global environment. In announcing the change of name, Acting Associate Administrator for Earth Science William Townsend said, "We feel that 'Earth Science' more clearly conveys to the American people the goals of our program, and more directly focuses on the research that we're conducting. 1998 will include several major launches in the enterprise, including the first Earth Observing System missions, and we are pleased to enter this era with the new name." The Earth Science enterprise is pioneering the emerging discipline of Earth system science, with a near-term emphasis on global climate change. Earth science research capabilities under development will yield a variety of new scientific understandings and practical benefits to humankind. The goals of the Earth Science enterprise are to expand scientific knowledge of the Earth system using NASA's unique vantage points of space, aircraft, and in situ platforms, creating an international capability to forecast and assess the health of the Earth system; to widely disseminate information about the Earth system; and to enable the productive use of Earth science results and related technology in the public and private sectors. The title "Mission to Planet Earth" originated ten years ago in a report on future directions for the U.S. civil space program by a commission led by former astronaut Dr. Sally Ride. The term and the concept of looking at Earth as NASA looks at other planets were furthered by the 1990 Report of the Advisory Committee on the Future of the U.S. Space Program, prepared by a team of experts chaired by Dr. Norman Augustine. Since that time, NASA has organized its activities into four strategic enterprises, including Human Exploration and Development of Space, Aeronautics and Space Transportation, and Space Science. In a manner similar to the way that the Space Science enterprise has been broadened to include questions about the origins and destiny of the Universe, the Mission to Planet Earth enterprise has been reshaped to answer key questions in five major Earth system science disciplines: land surface cover, near-term and long-term climate change, natural hazards research and atmospheric ozone. The renaming of the enterprise to "Earth Science" is effective immediately. NASA will continue to use all supplies, such as stationery, that bear the former name of "Mission to Planet Earth" until such supplies are depleted, so as to avoid any unnecessary cost to the Agency. -end- Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: NASA COMMITS TO SECOND VEHICLE FOR X-34 PROGRA Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... Jim Cast Headquarters, Washington, DC January 21, 1998 (Phone: 202/358-1779) Dom Amatore Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL (Phone: 205/544-0031) Barron Beneski Orbital Sciences Corp., Dulles, VA (Phone: 703/406-5528) RELEASE: 98-11 NASA COMMITS TO SECOND VEHICLE FOR X-34 PROGRAM NASA has modified its X-34 contract with Orbital Sciences Corp., Dulles, VA, to produce a second flight vehicle for the X-34 Program. "The purpose of a second vehicle is to reduce risk to the X-34 program," said deputy program manager Mike Allen of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL. "One of the lessons we learned from the Clipper Graham program is that it is desirable to have a second flight vehicle available, especially if it can be acquired at a relatively low cost." Clipper Graham was a previous technology demonstrator that NASA flew four times in 1996, until it was destroyed during landing. Under the new arrangement, X-34 test objectives are being expanded, adding, for example, unpowered tests to the flight profile. A second vehicle also will provide flexibility in demonstrating various technologies, Allen said, allowing testing that requires repetitive flights to continue at the same time as tests which require significant, time-consuming changes to the vehicle. In August 1996 NASA entered into a $50 million contract with Orbital Sciences Corp. to design, build and test-fly the X-34, a small, reusable technology demonstrator. An additional $10 million was committed by NASA to be spent in direct support of X- 34 by NASA Centers and other government agencies. Now the contract has been increased by $7.7 million to purchase long lead- time hardware, including a new wing, fuselage, avionics set, hydraulic pump and actuator system, and more. NASA has committed $2 million more for the government to provide wind tunnel testing, additional testing and analysis, and a second leading-edge Thermal Protection System. An $8.5 million option calls for purchase of shorter lead- time hardware, such as navigation systems, while a $1.8 million option has been added for assembly of piece parts into subsystems, integration and final assembly. These options should be formally exercised shortly. The X-34 is a single-engine rocket with short wings and a small tail surface. The vehicle is 58.3 feet long, 27.7 feet wide at wing tip and 11.5 feet tall from the bottom of the fuselage to the top of the tail. Capable of flying eight times the speed of sound and reaching an altitude of 250,000 feet, the X-34 will demonstrate low-cost reusability, autonomous landing, subsonic flights through inclement weather, safe abort conditions, and landing in 20-knot cross winds. The X-34 is designed to bridge the gap between the earlier Clipper Graham, or DC-XA, subsonic demonstrator vehicle, and the larger, more advanced X-33 vehicle. The X-34 will demonstrate key technologies applicable to development of a future Reusable Launch Vehicle. The overall goal of these vehicle programs is to demonstrate the key technologies needed to dramatically lower the cost of putting a pound of payload into space. - end - Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

Дата: 23 января 1998 (1998-01-23) От: Alexander Bondugin Тема: EARTH SWINGBY PUTS NEAR SPACECRAFT ON FINAL APPROACH TO EROS Привет всем! Вот, свалилось из Internet... Donald Savage Headquarters, Washington, DC January 20, 1998 (Phone: 202/358-1547) Helen Worth The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD (Phone: 301/953-5113) RELEASE: 98-9 EARTH SWINGBY PUTS NEAR SPACECRAFT ON FINAL APPROACH TO EROS NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft, built by The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, MD, will become the first interplanetary spacecraft that can possibly be seen with the naked eye when it swings by Earth Jan. 22-23. The spacecraft's solar panels will reflect the Sun's rays onto the Earth in a greeting as it flies by for an adjustment of its trajectory to correctly align the spacecraft for a rendezvous with asteroid 433 Eros, its mission target. Launched Feb. 17, 1996, NEAR completed a flyby of the asteroid Mathilde in June 1997 and is now on its way back to Earth. Late Thursday, Jan. 22, the spacecraft will approach Earth over the Pacific Ocean traveling at about 20,000 mph. Because the United States will be in darkness as NEAR approaches, if there is no cloud cover, several geographic areas will be able to see the Sun reflecting off the spacecraft's solar panels, which will act as large mirrors. These sunglints will be visible on the East Coast, Friday, Jan. 23, at about 1:30 a.m. EST and the West Coast at about 1:45 a.m. EST (Thursday, 10:45 p.m. PST). The spacecraft then swings around the Aleutian Islands and over Siberia before reaching its closest point to Earth, about 336 miles above Ahvaz in southwest Iran, Friday, Jan. 23, at 11:23 a.m. local time (2:23 a.m. EST), traveling at about 29,000 mph, its fastest speed for the swingby. Although NEAR will be close to Earth at this time, daylight may obscure its image. The spacecraft then swings over Africa and on to Antarctica before pulling away from the Earth at a speed of about 15,000 mph. The swingby will have changed NEAR's trajectory to approximately 11 degrees south of the Earth's ecliptic plane, the orbital path the Earth takes as it circles the Sun, and put the spacecraft on target for its Jan. 10, 1999, rendezvous with Eros. NEAR scientists and engineers are using the swingby as an opportunity to test performance and calibration of the spacecraft's six instruments and to practice coordinated multi- instrument observations of the type that will be used at Eros. The Multispectral Imager, a visible light camera that will help determine the physical characteristics of Eros, and the NEAR- Infrared Spectrograph, used to study surface minerals, will be calibrated by comparing their readings of geological features with proven measurements of the same areas. These instruments will also be used to take images of the Earth along the spacecraft's path. NEAR's Magnetometer will be calibrated by comparing swingby data with known measurements of the Earth's magnetic field. Other activities during the swingby will include using the X-Ray/Gamma-Ray Spectrometer to observe celestial gamma ray bursts and to collect data on gamma ray and X-ray backgrounds. These data are needed so scientists can better remove background impurities from the measurements to be made at Eros. NEAR is expected to capture its first images of Eros, a 25- mile-long near-Earth asteroid, a few months prior to the 100th anniversary of the asteroid's discovery on Aug. 13, 1898. After reaching Eros, the spacecraft will start its orbit about 600 miles above the asteroid's surface, descending to 200 miles by February and coming as close as 10 miles during its yearlong study. Scientists will thoroughly map Eros and will examine its surface composition and physical properties. On Feb. 6, 2000, the mission is expected to end with a controlled descent onto the asteroid, sending dozens of high-resolution pictures as the spacecraft closes in on Eros. The NEAR mission will be the first close-up study of an asteroid. APL, the first non-NASA center to conduct a NASA planetary mission, is managing the mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Information on the NEAR mission, including a list of areas most likely to see NEARХs sunglint and how to find NEAR as it swings by Earth, is available on the Internet at: http://sd- www.jhuapl.edu/NEAR/ - end - Hа сегодня все, пока! =SANA=

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