August 02, 2007. Baikonur launch site,
branch office of S.P. Korolev RSC Energia
Space transportation logistics vehicle Progress M-61 was launched to the International Space Station (ISS) from the Baikonur launch site at 21:33:48 Moscow Time.
The launch objective is to deliver to ISS more than 2.5 tons of various cargoes. These consist of supplies of oxygen, water and food, propellant, consumables, scientific equipment and hardware that are necessary to maintain the space station operation in manned mode and to provide conditions that are necessary for the crew living and working on-board the station, including a set of on-board computers for the Russian Segment of the space station.
The spacecraft was put into a baseline low-Earth orbit with 51.64° inclination, 191.4 km minimal altitude, 267.9 km maximum altitude, and 88.8 min orbital period.
The on-board systems of the spacecraft operate normally.
The spacecraft pre-launch processing and launch were carried out at the launch site under the direction of the State Commission. The Commission was making the decisions to proceed with different stages of pre-launch processing and launch based on the findings of the Technical Management.
Working at the Baikonur launch site during the pre-launch operations and launch were the RSC Energia President and Designer General V.A.Lopota, managers and specialists from S.P.Korolev RSC Energia, representatives of Roskosmos, subcontractors, and other organizations in the industry.
Observing the spacecraft pre-launch processing and launch were the head of the Federal Agency for Science and Innovations S.N.Mazurenko, director of the Russian scientific center Kurchatov Institute, acting vice president of the Russian Academy of Sciences M.V.Kovalchuk, representatives of the Russian Federation State Duma, NASA and the Japanese space agency.
According to telemetry data and reports from the crew of ISS Expedition 15, the on-board systems of the space station operate in normal modes. The space station is ready for the docking with the spacecraft, which is scheduled for August 5, 2007, approximately at 22:40.
Working on-board ISS is a crew consisting of Fedor Yurchikhin (RSC Energia cosmonaut tester, crew commander), Oleg Kotov (Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center cosmonaut tester, flight engineer) and Clayton Anderson (NASA astronaut, flight engineer).
|
|
)
)
)
)