Letter From Astronauts and Apollo Veterans Regarding Space Shuttle Retirement and Risk to ISS Operations

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=37583


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Large p/l bay in museum!

Isis places USA in danger, Bho helping them ( in getting nuclear weapons re iran deal) & aggressively destroying USA space capabilities

Listen to hannity today, he tells it like it is. Bho & Kerry are a disaster. We are in grave danger! Bho is a disaster! 

Hannity.com

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Dream of humans on Mars persists despite challenges - Houston Chronicle

To me his greatest failure & many experts agree. Bm

Most significantly, Bolden has accelerated efforts begun by his predecessor, Mike Griffin, to replace the space shuttle with privately developed spacecraft, SpaceX's Dragon and Boeing's CST-100.

NASA estimated that if it had built these vehicles using traditional budget processes, they would have cost the government six to eight times as much.

"To me, that is Charlie's greatest achievement," Mandell said.

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Dream-of-humans-on-Mars-persists-despite-6530488.php

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Fwd: 30 Years Since Atlantis' Maiden Voyage

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: September 27, 2015 at 9:59:02 PM CDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: 30 Years Since Atlantis' Maiden Voyage

 

 

AmericaSpace

For a nation that explores
September 26th, 2015

'For Tasks That Might or Might Not Take Place': 30 Years Since Atlantis' Maiden Voyage (Part 1)

By Ben Evans

 

During the course of her 33-mission career, which began 30 years ago on 3 October 1985, Atlantis flew more Department of Defense assignments than any other orbiter, beginning with her maiden voyage, 51J. In keeping with DoD missions, the patch was both highly symbolic and patriotic. Image Credit: NASA, via Joachim Becker/SpaceFacts.de

Thirty years ago, next week, Atlantis—which would go on to become the second most-flown orbiter in NASA's shuttle fleet, after Discovery—rocketed into orbit on her maiden voyage, Mission 51J. During that four-day mission, which began 3 October 1985, Atlantis and her five-man crew deployed a pair of classified Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS)-III military spacecraft, atop a single Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) booster. Although the payload was widely known, the usual levels of secrecy imposed on Department of Defense shuttle missions remained in place, with Atlantis' exact launch time withheld until T-9 minutes and her exact landing date kept under wraps until 24 hours prior to touchdown. It was a strangely quiet start to a career which would see her conduct 33 missions in almost 26 years, totaling over 306 days in orbit, during which Atlantis deployed more than a dozen major satellite payloads, visited the International Space Station (ISS) 12 times and Russia's Mir seven times, supported more dedicated Department of Defense missions than any other orbiter and performed both the final servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and the swansong flight of the shuttle program. Last week, veteran astronaut Dave Hilmers, one of Atlantis' first fliers, shared several memories of Mission 51J with AmericaSpace.

During those 33 missions, Atlantis ferried 148 discrete spacefarers from the United States, France, Russia, Canada and Germany safely into orbit, and back to Earth, as well as transporting the first-ever national astronauts from Mexico, Belgium, Switzerland and Italy. That figure includes such luminaries as Jerry Ross, the sole human to have flown Atlantis as many as five times, as well as three-time "Atlanteans" Shannon Lucid, Marsha Ivins and Rex Walheim and 35 others who journeyed to and from orbit aboard the vehicle on two separate occasions during their careers. Of the Atlantis "two-timers", the list includes Frenchman Jean-Francois Clervoy, Costa Rica-born Franklin Chang-Diaz and the commander of the first shuttle-Mir docking mission, Robert "Hoot" Gibson.

Yet these figures only serve to describe those men and women who actually launched and landed on Atlantis. Several others rode into orbit aboard her, yet returned to terra firma within the confines of another craft; either a different member of the shuttle fleet or a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. Their number includes cosmonauts Anatoli Solovyov and Nikolai Budarin, together with Frenchman Leopold Eyharts and U.S. astronaut Clay Anderson. Conversely, Russia's Vladimir Dezhurov and Gennadi Strekalov and U.S. astronauts Suni Williams, Dan Tani and Nicole Stott only ever landed aboard Atlantis, having received their ticket into space aboard other vehicles. Carrying this peculiarity a step further, astronaut Dave Wolf is unique in that he launched twice, but only ever landed once, aboard Atlantis during his career—having returned from a long-duration Mir occupancy aboard a different shuttle—whilst Norm Thagard offers an opposing perspective of polarity: as the first American ever to launch aboard a Soyuz, he landed twice, but only ever launched once, on Atlantis.

Atlantis currently resides at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida, the site from which she launched on 33 occasions between October 1985 and July 2011. Photo Credit: Alan Walters/AmericaSpace/awaltersphoto.com

Confused yet? You should be, for during Atlantis' glittering 33 missions, she rendezvoused and docked with the Mir orbital outpost on seven occasions between June 1995 and October 1997 and with the ISS on 12 occasions between May 2000 and the final flight of the shuttle program, STS-135 in July 2011. The consequence was that 29 other spacefarers— including the first ISS Commander, Bill Shepherd, the first European ISS Commander, Frank de Winne, and the first female ISS Commander, Peggy Whitson, together with numerous Mir  residents—were on hand to welcome her after docking in orbit. Interestingly, ten individuals happened upon Atlantis on more than one mission during their careers, including Germany's Thomas Reiter, who witnessed her arrival at both Mir on STS-74 in November 1995 and at the ISS on STS-115 in September 2006, and Russian cosmonaut Valeri Korzun, the only human to have boarded Atlantis three times in space, but never to have actually launched or landed aboard her. (Korzun was aboard Mir in September 1996 and January 1997, during Atlantis' STS-79 and STS-81 dockings, and aboard the ISS in October 2002, to welcome STS-112.) All told, 187 people from the United States, Mexico, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, France, Russia, Canada, Germany and Japan have boarded Atlantis for launch, landing or whilst in orbit at some point between October 1985 and July 2011.

Next week, on 3 October, as NASA's Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex (KSCVC) marks the 30th anniversary of Atlantis' maiden voyage, the center of attention will of course be upon the ship herself, together with the men and women who flew her, but specifically the five astronauts—all of whom, thankfully, are still with us—who participated in Mission 51J. And all five carved their own niches into the annals of human space exploration. Commander Karol "Bo" Bobko remains the only human to have flown aboard the maiden voyages of two orbiters, whereas Ron Grabe was the first shuttle pilot to fly twice aboard Atlantis. Of their crewmates, Dave Hilmers went on to participate in the first post-Challenger mission, STS-26, whilst Bob Stewart had earned himself a place in history by trialing the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) "jet backpack", earlier in his astronaut career. The final member of the 51J crew was Bill Pailes, the second (and last) Air Force Manned Spaceflight Engineer (MSE) to participate in a shuttle flight.

The "core" NASA crew of Bobko, Grabe, Hilmers and Stewart had originally been named on 17 November 1983, alongside fellow astronaut Mike Mullane, to a so-called "DoD Standby Crew", in support of future Department of Defense shuttle requirements. "Even those of us on the crew didn't know what that meant," Hilmers later explained in his 2013 memoir, Man on a Mission. "It didn't have an official flight number and it hadn't been assigned to any of the three orbiters that were in the fleet at the time." He added that, for several months, "the five of us trained for tasks that might or might not actually take place". Finally, on 15 February 1985, Bobko, Grabe, Hilmers and Stewart were assigned to 51J—tracking a No Earlier Than (NET) launch date of 26 September, 30 years ago, today—whilst Mullane moved onto the 62A crew, which was destined in the pre-Challenger era to become the first shuttle flight out of Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. Pailes joined them as the fifth and final member of the 51J crew.

"There were kind of mixed feelings about that crew assignment," Hilmers told AmericaSpace of the DoD Standby Crew. "It was great to be named to a crew, but we didn't have a specific flight slot. I believe at one time we thought we were going to be assigned to the first shuttle flight out of Vandenberg, but that was kind of nebulous. So we did some generic training sessions together as a crew, but it was kind of bittersweet since we really didn't have any flight hardware to work on, or crew procedures to develop. More importantly, we didn't have a flight date." The firm assignment to 51J changed the situation markedly and Hilmers lucidly remembered the summons to the office of George W.S. Abbey, director of the Flight Crew Operations Directorate (FCOD). "It was exciting," he reflected. "We were called to Building 1 to see Mr. Abbey and everyone knew what that meant. It came to be a familiar process."

The crew of 51J are pictured at the end of their Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test (TCDT), standing in front of an M-113 armored personnel carrier, which would be used in the event of an emergency evacuation from the launch pad. Karol 'Bo' Bobko (left) was joined on the flight by Ron Grabe, Dave Hilmers, Bob Stewart and Bill Pailes. Photo Credit: NASA

Remarkably, 51J suffered from only minimal slippage in its flight schedule, considering that it was the first outing for a new orbiter. Following a lengthy construction period—which began with the initial contract award to Rockwell International in January 1979—Atlantis achieved structural completion in April 1984 and, after an expansive series of tests, was transported overland from Rockwell's facility in Palmdale, Calif., to Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., in April 1985, and flown atop the Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) to the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida.

"We certainly monitored the progress of Atlantis closely, but we didn't have a lot of direct involvement in the processing and testing," Hilmers told AmericaSpace. "We made one trip to Palmdale, Calif., to see Atlantis before it went to KSC and we went to the Cape for some final testing. However, we were too busy training to get too involved in the day-to-day processing. There were astronauts assigned to the Cape [the "Cape Crusaders"] who took care of that for the office."

Arriving at the Cape on 13 April 1985, Atlantis spent time in the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) and in "storage" in the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) until she was mated to her External Tank (ET) and twin Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) and rolled to Pad 39A on 30 August. As described in last weekend's AmericaSpace history articles, she underwent the customary Flight Readiness Firing (FRF) of her three Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs), thus clearing a key milestone in NASA's effort to get her into orbit.

"The five of us were fairly quiet guys, who didn't make a lot of noise, Bo included," Hilmers wrote of himself and his crewmates. "We didn't raise much of a ruckus over anything, and as a result, we all got along really well." With Bobko, Grabe and Pailes representing the Air Force, Hilmers the Marine Corps and Stewart—the first Purple Heart-holder ever to journey into space—having already secured recognition as America's inaugural Army astronaut, their military backgrounds gave them a common thread. This produced some mild inter-service rivalry, including one instance when Hilmers ribbed Stewart over the "toughness" of his Army basic training…"down at the Holiday Inn Express".

Speaking to AmericaSpace, Hilmers described the 51J crew as "kind of mild-mannered men", noting that Bobko and Stewart served as "team leaders", as they were the only veterans. He also noted that, although today they rarely have reunions, "we bump into each other now and then", adding that Ron Grabe's daughter was later a medical student at Baylor College of Medicine after Hilmers became a professor there. "She did some research with me," he recalled.

As their military thread kept the 51J crew unified, so too did their faith. "Of the four crews on which I served, 51J was probably the most uniformly religious," Hilmers wrote. "A group of us in the Astronaut Office routinely held Bible studies throughout my time with the agency, and on this flight in particular, we all seemed to be on the same basic page when it came to our faith." To Hilmers, it "meant the world" when the five of them shared a prayer on the morning of 3 October 1985, just before heading to the launch pad and Atlantis.

 

The author would like to thank Professor David Hilmers for his time and assistance in responding to questions for this article.

 

Copyright © 2015 AmericaSpace - All Rights Reserved

 

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AmericaSpace

For a nation that explores
September 27th, 2015

'A New Orbiter Joins the Shuttle Fleet': 30 Years Since Atlantis' Maiden Voyage (Part 2)

By Ben Evans

 

Not until the summer of 1998 were any images from this most "vanilla" of Department of Defense flights revealed … although the nature of the flight had long since trickled into the public domain. A pair of Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS)-III satellites, mounted atop a Boeing-built Inertial Upper Stage, are here raised to their deployment angle in Atlantis' payload bay. Photo Credit: NASA

Next week, on 3 October, NASA's Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex (KSCVC) plans to celebrate 30 years since the maiden launch of perhaps its most prized exhibit—Atlantis, the second most-flown member of the space shuttle fleet, after Discovery—with a day of "meet and greets" and signing opportunities featuring many of her former astronauts, including Jerry Ross, the only human to have flown her on as many as five occasions. Throughout her 26-year operational career, Atlantis visited space 33 times, visited the International Space Station (ISS) 12 times, visited Russia's Mir orbital outpost seven times, and visited the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) once. Almost 200 men and women from nine sovereign nations voyaged aboard her, with the majority inhabiting her from launch through touchdown, but a handful journeyed uphill to orbit, downhill from orbit or met Atlantis midway as she joined them for a few days of docked space station operations. (In fact, one Russian cosmonaut, Valeri Korzun, met Atlantis as many as three times in orbit, yet never rode to or from orbit aboard her.) It might be supposed that such an illustrious career might have gotten off to an illustrious start, but Atlantis' first flight, Mission 51J in October 1985, was one of the quietest and most "vanilla" shuttle flights ever undertaken. Last week, veteran astronaut Dave Hilmers, one of Atlantis' first fliers, shared several memories of Mission 51J with AmericaSpace.

As noted in yesterday's AmericaSpace history article, the crew for Mission 51J changed significantly, following the initial NASA announcement of Commander Karol "Bo" Bobko, Pilot Ron Grabe, and Mission Specialists Bob Stewart, Mike Mullane, and Dave Hilmers as a "DoD Standby Crew" in November 1983. It had long been recognized that the shuttle would be utilized for a series of classified Department of Defense assignments, but in his 2013 memoir, Man on a Mission, Hilmers reflected that "even those of us on the crew didn't know what it meant." The Standby Crew had been appointed alongside several others, with the exception that the others had specific flight designations and payloads. For several months into 1984, Hilmers wrote, "the five of us trained for tasks that might or might not actually take place." At length, on 15 February 1985, Bobko, Grabe, Hilmers, and Stewart were formally assigned to 51J—tracking a No Earlier Than (NET) launch date of 26 September—whilst Mullane moved onto the 62A crew, which was destined in the pre-Challenger era to become the first shuttle flight out of Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. An Air Force Manned Spaceflight Engineer (MSE), named Bill Pailes, joined them as the fifth and final member of the crew.

Their primary mission objective was to deliver a pair of classified Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS)-III military spacecraft, atop a single, Boeing-built Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) booster, toward a 22,300-mile-high (35,600-km) geostationary orbit. Ironically, despite the usual levels of secrecy imposed on Department of Defense flights remained in place—with Atlantis' exact launch time withheld until T-9 minutes and her exact landing date kept under wraps until 24 hours prior to the scheduled touchdown—the nature of the DSCS-III payload was well known in the open media, long before the shuttle departed Pad 39A at 11:15 a.m. EST on 3 October 1985. Details appeared in the pages of Aviation Week before Atlantis touched down, and, today, deployment images have long since been declassified and are firmly in the public domain, but only because the DSCS-IIIs were military communications satellites and not "deep black" reconnaissance or intelligence-gathering satellites. For that reason, more than two decades since the shuttle's last classified flight, most of the Department of Defense missions remain classified and rumor continues to abound over their nature.

Commander Karol "Bo" Bobko leads Bob Stewart, Dave Hilmers, Ron Grabe, and Bill Pailes out of the Operations & Checkout (O&C) Building on launch morning, 3 October 1985, bound for Pad 39A and Atlantis. Photo Credit: NASA, via Joachim Becker/SpaceFacts.de

Mission 51J began with an upset wife. Management consultant Diane Bobko was particularly irritated as her husband prepared for his third voyage into space. Unlike his previous missions—STS-6, the maiden flight of Challenger, in April 1983 and Mission 51D, which supported the first contingency EVA of the shuttle era in April 1985—this one was classified and she knew that he could tell her very little about it.

"Bo," she said, one morning in September 1985, "you're not telling me exactly what day, you're going to land, but I think it's going to be pretty close to a day I have a program in Baltimore."

"Diane, it's the first flight of a new vehicle," her husband replied. "Probably the safest thing you can do is go ahead and schedule that right now." From his perspective, Bobko had been intimately familiar with the delays which struck Challenger, during the months preceding her maiden voyage, and anticipated that the inaugural voyage of Atlantis would also meet with significant delay. Ironically, it did not.

Command of this new flight posed something of a problem in the spring of 1985, particularly when Bobko's previous mission was canceled and he ended up leading his crew into orbit in April, under a different designation. The inevitable consequence was that Grabe, Hilmers, and Stewart were forced to train without him for a time. What really made 51J a pain was its classified nature, in which the astronauts had to conduct virtually their entire training in secret, filing misleading flight plans to training destinations … and then finding out through the pages of Aviation Week and Flight International that details of their supposedly "secret" payload had leaked and been exposed.

In fact, the twin DSCS-III satellites became something of an "open" secret and details were published as early as 7 October 1985, the very day that Atlantis touched down at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. A single IUS booster carried the $160 million satellites, stacked one atop the other, images of which were finally declassified in the summer of 1998. They lend credence to Bobko's claim that, for all its "secrecy," 51J was little more than a "vanilla" shuttle deployment flight.

The DSCS—nicknamed "the discus"—has long been an anchor for the Pentagon's global communications network, operating in geostationary orbit with half a dozen super-high-frequency transponders for secure voice and data transmissions and high-priority command and control links between officials and battlefield commanders. The Air Force later admitted that it had launched two DSCS-IIIs in 1985 and, according to space analyst Dwayne Day, "the only launch that year that fit was the Atlantis mission." Subsequent documents highlighted that the DSCS-III satellites had been deployed during a shuttle flight, but refused to reveal the name of that flight … even though it could be quite easily inferred. "Military secrecy can be bizarre at times," wrote Day, "like acknowledging that there is a sky, and that the sky can be blue, but never saying that the sky is blue!"

Atlantis roars into orbit on the first of her 33 missions. In all, she would fly five dedicated Department of Defense missions, more than any of her sisters. Photo Credit: NASA, via Joachim Becker/SpaceFacts.de

Physically, the satellites were roughly cube-shaped, with a pair of articulated solar panels which produced 1,240 watts of electrical power. They measured 6.6 feet (2 meters) in height, spanned 37.7 feet (11.5 meters) across their expansive solar array "wings" and weighed 5,730 pounds (2,600 kg). Day considered it significant that 51J's payload was so readily revealed, but the natures of the other classified satellites launched between December 1988 and December 1992 have been kept under wraps to this very day. "If the suspected identities of the other classified shuttle flights are correct," he speculated in an article for the Space Review in January 2010, "then they are intelligence satellites. Considering the secrecy that remains about American intelligence satellites, it seems likely that these other flights will continue to remain secret for a long time to come."

Originally scheduled for No Earlier Than (NET) 26 September 1985, Atlantis' maiden launch met with relatively little delay, passing through a smooth processing flow in the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) and Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) and—as detailed in last weekend's AmericaSpace history articles—concluding a picture-perfect Flight Readiness Firing (FRF) of her three Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) on Pad 39A. With the launch date eventually settling on 3 October, it was revealed that Atlantis would fly during a four-hour period, extending from 10:20 a.m. through 2:20 p.m. EST, although the threat of rain showers offshore prompted Air Force meteorologists to predict a 60 percent likelihood of acceptable conditions at T-0.

As well as the vague launch time, which would only be known when the countdown clock passed out of its final hold at T-9 minutes, the length of 51J itself was unclear, with one media outlet suggesting a duration of five or six days. It subsequently became clear that the launch attempt endured a 22-minute delay to deal with a power controller in one of the SSMEs' liquid hydrogen prevalves, which had thrown up a faulty indication. At length, the assembled spectators at KSC became aware that launch was imminent when the blank face of the famous countdown clock suddenly came to life and started ticking at T-9 minutes.

It had been an exciting morning for the 51J crew, which included only two veterans (Bobko and Stewart) and three first-timers (Grabe, Hilmers, and Pailes). "It was one of the last flights before the Challenger accident and we launched wearing only some basic survival gear," Hilmers told AmericaSpace. "It was such a contrast to the remainder of my flights, in which we wore the elaborate and much more cumbersome orange suits."

Following the passage of T-9 minutes, the standard pre-flight procedures kicked in at this stage, accompanied by NASA coverage. At T-5 minutes, Ron Grabe activated the shuttle's Auxiliary Power Units (APUs). Shortly thereafter, the Solid Rocket Booster (SRB0 firing sequence and Range Safety Officer (RSO) circuit were armed and the five-man crew closed their helmet visors. Final helium purging of the SSMEs began and the Ground Launch Sequencer (GLS) determined that APU pressures were normal for launch. By T-3 minutes and 30 seconds, Atlantis was on internal power, as her elevons, speed brake, and rudder were maneuvered through a pre-programmed pattern and SSME gimbaling was completed. This was followed by the closure of the liquid oxygen valve to the External Tank (ET), retraction of the gaseous oxygen ("beanie") cap and the movement of the SSMEs to their start positions. From the pilot's seat on the right side of the cockpit, Grabe confirmed that Atlantis' Caution & Warning (C&W) memory was cleared, with no unexpected errors.

At T-2 minutes, the ET's liquid hydrogen valve was closed and all tanks had reached flight pressure within the following 45 seconds. With a minute to go, the sound suppression system of four giant "rainbirds," positioned at the base of Pad 39A, were armed, as were the hydrogen burn igniters, which would dissipate residual gases underneath the SSMEs, ahead of Main Engine Start.

"T-31 seconds," came the call, as control of the 51J countdown was transferred from GLS to the Autosequencer and the shuttle's on-board suite of General Purpose Computer (GPCs). "And we have the sequencer on the orbiter now controlling the final seconds to launch … 20 seconds and counting … the body flap and speed brake in launch position … T-12, 11, 10 … we have Go for Main Engine Start … "

The twin Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS)-III satellites are clearly visible, atop their Inertial Upper Stage (IUS), during deployment operations. This and other images were finally declassified in the summer of 1998, some 13 years after Mission 51J. Photo Credit: NASA, via Joachim Becker/SpaceFacts.de

All at once the flurry of hydrogen burn igniters sparked beneath the dark SSME bells, which suddenly erupted into life with a sheer of translucent orange flame, which quickly gave way to a trio of dancing Mach diamonds. In the final seconds, Atlantis' computers commanded the engines up to full power.

" … we have Main Engine Start … four, three, two, one … ignition … and liftoff … Liftoff of Atlantis. A new orbiter joins the shuttle fleet and it has cleared the tower!"

Liftoff came at 11:15:30 a.m. EST. Unlike most other missions, where the Commander could be heard confirming the "Roll Program" maneuver, it was the Public Affairs Officer (PAO) who announced "Roll Program initiated; crew confirms roll maneuver," as Atlantis departed Pad 39A and embarked onto the proper heading for its 8.5-minute climb uphill. This was followed by several other clipped acknowledgements during first-stage first: "26 seconds, beginning throttle-back to 65 percent, pass through the area of maximum aerodynamic pressure on the vehicle," then subsequent confirmation that the SSMEs had returned to 104-percent rated performance, followed by "Crew given a Go at throttle-up" and "Commander Bobko acknowledging that Go at throttle-up." By this stage, Atlantis was already 13.8 miles (22.2 km) in altitude and 10.4 miles (16.7 km) downrange of the launch site, traveling in excess of 2,380 mph (3,830 km/h).

Nearing the two-minute mark into the flight, it was reported that "Crew confirms P/C less than 50," as the chamber pressures in the twin SRBs tailed off, ahead of their separation. "And we have solid rocket separation," came the call from PAO. "Guidance converging as programmed." Now far higher into the rarefied atmosphere, Atlantis and her five astronauts—of whom Grabe, Hilmers, and Pailes were making their first spaceflights—had attained an altitude of 32.2 miles (51.8 km) and a downrange distance of 39.1 miles (62.9 km) and were accelerating through 3,750 mph (6,000 km/h). A further six minutes under the impulse of her SSMEs and Atlantis reached orbit for the first time.

Atlantis alights on Runway 23 at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., on 7 October 1985. Mission 51J would be the second-shortest of her 33-flight career. Photo Credit: NASA, via Joachim Becker/SpaceFacts.de

For Hilmers, seated behind Grabe in the Mission Specialist 1 seat on Atlantis' flight deck, it was a moment he would never forget. "That first view of Earth from space was amazing," he told AmericaSpace. "I remember how brilliant the first sunrise seemed. A more humorous incident occurred when I forgot to add water to the dehydrated sausage when it was my turn to cook breakfast. I was permanently taken off duty as the chef!"

Yet there was still a degree of uncertainty about 51J. Flight International suggested (correctly) that if the rumors about the presence of DSCS-III satellites were accurate, then an IUS was the most likely booster, but suggested the possibility that other instruments might also be aboard, such as the Cryogenic Infrared Radiance Instrument for Shuttle (CIRRIS) and a laser retroreflector for Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI, or "Star Wars") research. The Air Force cleverly refused to confirm or deny any such rumors. After 97 hours and 44 minutes—making it the seventh-shortest shuttle flight of all time and the second-shortest flight of Atlantis' entire career, after STS-30—Mission 51J concluded with a perfect landing at Edwards at 10:00:08 a.m. PST (1:00:08 p.m. EST) on 7 October 1985.

As the fast-descending black-and-white speck of the orbiter appeared on the desolate Mojave horizon, then alighted on Runway 23, the NASA PAO picked up the commentary: "Touchdown Main Gear … Touchdown Nose Wheel … and the fourth orbiter in NASA's fleet, Atlantis, rolls out on landing, concluding Space Shuttle Mission 51J."

As it turned out, Diane Bobko was in California to meet her husband on the runway. Astonishingly, Atlantis had met with no significant delays, launched on time and landed on time. "So she was there to meet me in California," Bobko remembered, "gave me a hug and then she had to leave right away to … drive down to Los Angeles to catch the airplane to go to Baltimore." Later that evening, Bobko was startled out of his sleep by a telephone call. It was his wife. Surely, he thought, if a vehicle as complex as the shuttle could launch and land on time, on its maiden voyage, then her domestic flight would have been trouble-free.

"You're in Baltimore?" he asked.

"No," she replied, glumly. "I'm still in Dallas, trying to get to Baltimore!"

 

The author would like to thank Professor David Hilmers for his time and assistance in responding to questions for this article.

 

Copyright © 2015 AmericaSpace - All Rights Reserved

 

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These capabilities critical to survival of USA ! Commercial approaches lack funding & are inadequate. Re nasaproblems.com

EO capabilities are critical to the survival of the USA !

The USA has considerable number of systems in EO that are critical to our military & economy. Shuttle like capabilities are needed to repair & maintain these systems . The Hubble telescope is a good example.

However, very few of our leaders apparently give this capability any thought.
Now with present " leadership" our capabilities have seriously declined & must be regained or the U.S. will be seriously impacted!

Fwd: China Plans Lunar Far Side Landing by 2020

Sent from my iPad

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: September 24, 2015 at 3:12:32 PM CDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: China Plans Lunar Far Side Landing by 2020

 

 

China Plans Lunar Far Side Landing by 2020

by Ken Kremer on September 23, 2015

 

China plans lunar far side landing with hardware similar to Chang'e-3 lander
This time-lapse color panorama from China's Chang'e-3 lander shows the Yutu rover at two different positions during its trek over the Moon's surface at its landing site from Dec. 15-18, 2013. This view was taken from the 360-degree panorama. Credit: CNSA/Chinanews/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo.
See our complete Yutu timelapse pano at NASA APOD Feb. 3, 2014:

China aims to land a science probe and research rover on the far side of the Moon by 2020, say Chinese officials.

Chinese scientists plan to carry out the highly complex lunar landing mission using a near identical back up to the nations highly successful Chang'e-3 rover and lander – which touched down in December 2013.

If successful, China would become the first country to accomplish the history making task of a Lunar far side landing.

"The mission will be carried out by Chang'e-4, a backup probe for Chang'e-3, and is slated to be launched before 2020," said Zou Yongliao from the moon exploration department under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, according to a recent report in China's government owned Xinhua news agency.

Zou made the remarks at a deep-space exploration forum in China.

"China will be the first to complete the task if it is successful," said Zou.

Chinese space scientists have been evaluating how best to utilize the Chang'e-4 hardware, built as a backup to Chang'e-3, ever since China's successful inaugural soft landing on the Moon was accomplished by Chang'e-3 in December 2013 with the mothership lander and piggybacked Yutu lunar rover.

Chang'e-3/Yutu Timelapse Color Panorama This newly expanded timelapse composite view shows China's Yutu moon rover at two positions passing by crater and heading south and away from the Chang'e-3 lunar landing site forever about a week after the Dec. 14, 2013 touchdown at Mare Imbrium. This cropped view was taken from the 360-degree timelapse panorama. See complete 360 degree landing site timelapse panorama herein and APOD Feb. 3, 2014. Chang'e-3 landers extreme ultraviolet (EUV) camera is at right, antenna at left. Credit: CNSA/Chinanews/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo – kenkremer.com. See our complete Yutu timelapse pano at NASA APOD Feb. 3, 2014: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap140203.html

Plans to launch Chang'e-4 in 2016 were eventually abandoned in favor of further evaluation.

After completing an intense 12 month study ordered by China's government, space officials confirmed that the lunar far side landing was the wisest use of the existing space hardware.

Chang'e-4 will be modified with a larger payload.

"Chang'e-4 is very similar to Chang'e-3 in structure but can handle more payload," said Zou.

"It will be used to study the geological conditions of the dark side of the moon."

The moon is tidally locked with the Earth so that only one side is ever visible. But that unique characteristic makes it highly attractive to scientists who have wanted to set up telescopes and other research experiments on the lunar far side for decades.

"The far side of the moon has a clean electromagnetic environment, which provides an ideal field for low frequency radio study. If we can can place a frequency spectrograph on the far side, we can fill a void," Zou elaborated.

China will also have to launch another lunar orbiter in the next few years to enable the Chang'e-4 lander and rover to transmit signals and science data back to Chinese mission control on Earth.

In the meantime, China already announced its desire to forge ahead with an ambitious mission to return samples from the lunar surface later this decade.

The Chinese National Space Agency (CNSA) plans to launch the Chang'e-5 lunar sample return mission in 2017 as the third step in the nations far reaching lunar exploration program.

"Chang'e-5 will achieve several breakthroughs, including automatic sampling, ascending from the moon without a launch site and an unmanned docking 400,000 kilometers above the lunar surface," said Li Chunlai, one of the main designers of the lunar probe ground application system, accoding to Xinhua.

The first step involved a pair of highly successful lunar orbiters named Chang'e-1 and Chang'e-2 which launched in 2007 and 2010.

The second step involved the hugely successful Chang'e-3 mothership lander and piggybacked Yutu moon rover which safely touched down on the Moon at Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) on Dec. 14, 2013 – marking China's first successful spacecraft landing on an extraterrestrial body in history, and chronicled extensively in my reporting here at Universe Today.

360-degree time-lapse color panorama from China's Chang'e-3 lander. This new 360-degree time-lapse color panorama from China's Chang'e-3 lander shows the Yutu rover at five different positions, including passing by crater and heading south and away from the Chang'e-3 lunar landing site forever during its trek over the Moon's surface at its landing site from Dec. 15-22, 2013 during the 1st Lunar Day. Credit: CNSA/Chinanews/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo – kenkremer.com. See our Yutu timelapse pano at NASA APOD Feb. 3, 2014: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap140203.html

See above and herein our time-lapse photo mosaics showing China's Yutu rover dramatically trundling across the Moon's stark gray terrain in the first weeks after she rolled all six wheels onto the desolate lunar plains.

The complete time-lapse mosaic shows Yutu at three different positions trekking around the landing site, and gives a real sense of how it maneuvered around on its 1st Lunar Day.

The 360 degree panoramic mosaic was created by the imaging team of scientists Ken Kremer and Marco Di Lorenzo from images captured by the color camera aboard the Chang'e-3 lander and was featured at Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) on Feb. 3, 2014.

Chang'e-3 and Yutu landed on a thick deposit of volcanic material.

Mosaic of the Chang'e-3 moon lander and the lunar surface taken by the camera on China's Yutu moon rover from a position south of the lander during Lunar Day 3. Note the landing ramp and rover tracks at left. Credit: CNSA/SASTIND/Xinhua/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer

China is only the 3rd country in the world to successfully soft land a spacecraft on Earth's nearest neighbor after the United States and the Soviet Union.  

 

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Fwd: Orbital ATK beats out Aerojet in ULA booster selection

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: September 24, 2015 at 3:14:34 PM CDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Orbital ATK beats out Aerojet in ULA booster selection

 

Orbital ATK beats out Aerojet in ULA booster selection

September 22, 2015 by Stephen Clark

File photo of Orbital ATK's GEM-60 solid rocket booster before attachment to a Delta 4 rocket. The Atlas 5 and Vulcan rockets will use an enlarged version of the motor beginning at the end of 2018. Credit: NASA

United Launch Alliance has selected Orbital ATK to provide solid rocket boosters for the company's next-generation Vulcan launcher, and will switch the workhorse Atlas 5 to the new booster supplier by the end of 2018, officials said Tuesday.

The Atlas 5 currently flies with solid rocket boosters made by Aerojet Rocketdyne, a rival of Orbital ATK in the U.S. rocket propulsion industry.

ULA said in a statement the selection of Orbital ATK's motors for Atlas 5 and Vulcan will "significantly lower the price to ULA and to the U.S. government."

Aerojet Rocketdyne is the primary propulsion supplier for ULA's rocket family, building the current Atlas 5 boosters, the RS-68 main engine for the Delta 4, and the RL10 upper stage engines for both Atlas and Delta.

But the company may lose the title as ULA transitions to a new, more commercially competitive rocket family, responding to pressure from SpaceX, which aims to eat into ULA's dominance of the U.S. government launch market.

ULA says the leading candidate to build first stage engines for the Vulcan rocket is Blue Origin, owned by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, which is developing a methane-fueled propulsion system that officials say could be certified by 2017. Aerojet Rocketdyne's AR1 engine is two years behind, according to ULA, a 50-50 joint venture owned by Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Boeing officials confirmed reports earlier this month that Aerojet Rocketdyne attempted to buy ULA. A Boeing spokesperson said Sept. 16 the unsolicited bid, reportedly worth $2 billion, was "not something we seriously entertained for a number of reasons."

ULA officials have not commented on the matter.

File photo of an Atlas 5 rocket with Aerojet Rocketdyne's boosters. Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

"As ULA transforms the space lift industry, strong partners such as Orbital ATK are critical to reducing cost, introducing cutting-edge innovation and continuing our focus on mission success," said Tory Bruno, ULA's president and CEO, in a press release. "We have relied for decades on Orbital ATK's industry leading rocket motor technology, which is ideally suited to support our future rocket launch plans."

The new Orbital ATK-made boosters are 63 inches in diameter and approximately the same 67-foot height as the Aerojet motors, according to Jason Meredith, the GEM-63 and GEM-63XL program manager at Orbital ATK.

The boosters are slightly wider than the 60-inch diameter motors Orbital ATK produces for ULA's Delta 4 rocket line. Earlier motors in Orbital ATK's graphite epoxy motor, or GEM, series include smaller boosters for the Delta 2 rocket.

"The GEM-63 will be designed for the Atlas as a drop-in replacement," Meredith said Tuesday in an interview. "It's roughly the same dimensions, very close, to what is provided by Aerojet today."

A lengthened booster about 5 feet taller will help ULA's new Vulcan rocket loft heavier payloads into orbit. ULA says the Vulcan rocket will be ready for a maiden flight in 2019.

"We're still in the design phase (of the GEM-63XL for Vulcan) and working through that with ULA, but we've had to do some additional sizing of that motor to provide the performance required for Vulcan," Meredith told Spaceflight Now.

File photo of a Delta 4 rocket with Orbital ATK's GEM-60 boosters. Credit: ULA

ULA mission planners can cluster multiple solid rocket boosters around the base of the Atlas 5 rocket depending on the needs of its payload. For bigger satellites or interplanetary probes like NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto, technicians can bolt on up to five solid rocket boosters to augment thrust from the Atlas 5's RD-180 main engine.

Because the Orbital ATK booster is sized as a "drop-in replacement" for the Aerojet motors, the Atlas 5 is still expected to carry up to five boosters per flight, Meredith said.

Like Orbital ATK's other monolithic boosters, the GEM-63 and GEM-63XL will burn a pre-packed rubber-like propellant mixture called HTPB, according to Meredith, who said development and fabrication of the new rocket motors will occur at three Orbital ATK facilities in northern Utah.

"With this strategic partnership, ULA and Orbital ATK will offer customers better value and reliable access to space," said David Thompson, president and CEO of Orbital ATK. "The capabilities and technology of the newly-merged Orbital ATK enabled us to expand the partnership with ULA to help lower costs and maintain the highest standards of mission assurance."

The Atlas 5 rocket has flown with 72 of the Aerojet-made AJ-60A motors in its 56 flights since 2002. The GEM-63 motors will have fixed nozzles like the existing Atlas boosters, Meredith said.

The AJ-60A motors generate an average 280,000 pounds of thrust during their 90-second burn. Officials did not provide performance numbers for the GEM-63 booster, but the 60-inch version flown on Delta 4 provides about 280,000 pounds of thrust, the same as the Aerojet motor.

Meredith said the first ground firing of a GEM-63 motor is scheduled for mid-2018, and the booster will be ready for Atlas 5 launches by the end of 2018.

An artist's concept of the Vulcan rocket released by ULA on Tuesday (right) shows conical boosters replacing motors with curved tops (left) shown in previous illustrations. Credit: ULA/Spaceflight Now

Orbital ATK's motors have conical nose cones instead of the aerodynamically-shaped tops on Aerojet's boosters. Meredith said Orbital ATK will build the GEM-63 nose cones to ULA's specifications, adding "I think you can anticipate that it will look a lot like the current Atlas system."

Jessica Rye, a ULA spokesperson, said the GEM-63 boosters will be cone-shaped, not curved.

"We've been talking with ULA for over a year now, maybe a little bit longer than that," Meredith said. "As long as ULA has been looking at specifically the Vulcan launch vehicle, we've been engaged trying to work with them at least a year, maybe as many as two years, in trying to provide them solutions for strap-on boosters for the Vulcan. This announcement today of strap-on boosters for Atlas and Vulcan has grown out of those discusions over the last couple of years."

For Orbital ATK, the booster contract with ULA will keep the graphite epoxy motor line alive after the retirement of the Delta 4's single-stick medium-lift configuration in 2018 or 2019.

The Delta 4-Heavy version, which will continue flying into the 2020s, does not use solid rocket boosters.

Meredith said he did not know when Delta 4 booster production will end, but the GEM-63 program "clearly provides a great transition for that line of motors to continue on into the future."

 

© 2015 Spaceflight Now Inc.

 

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ULA Picks Orbital ATK as Exclusive Supplier of Solid Motors

by Mike Gruss — September 23, 2015

Orbital ATK will be the sole provider of solid-rocket boosters for United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5 and next-generation Vulcan rockets starting around 2019 as part of a new long-term strategic partnership.

WASHINGTON – Orbital ATK will be the sole provider of solid-rocket boosters for United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5 and next-generation Vulcan rockets starting around 2019, the companies announced Sept. 22.

The new boosters, which Orbital ATK will begin designing, are expected to be available about the same time ULA has said the Vulcan would make its first flight.

"We have relied for decades on Orbital ATK's industry leading rocket motor technology, which is ideally suited to support our future rocket launch plans," Tory Bruno, ULA's president and chief executive, said in a press release.

Orbital ATK of Dulles, Virginia, has long provided solid-rocket boosters for ULA's Delta 4 rocket, while Aerojet Rocketdyne has supplied similar motors for ULA's Atlas 5. All but the heaviest version of the Delta 4 — this variant does not use solid-rocket motors — are being retired in the coming years.

Under the deal, Orbital ATK is developing two similar rocket motors: one for the Vulcan and one for Atlas 5, which ULA has said will fly operate concurrently with the Vulcan for several years.  The new motors also will be commercially available for other customers, the release said.

Specifics, including costs, of what the companies described as a  "long-term strategic partnership," were not immediately available.

"ULA and Orbital ATK will offer customers better value and reliable access to space," David Thompson, president and chief executive of Orbital ATK, said in the release. "The capabilities and technology of the newly-merged Orbital ATK enabled us to expand the partnership with ULA to help lower costs and maintain the highest standards of mission assurance."

In addition to the solid rocket boosters for Delta 4, Orbital ATK already provides composite structures, nozzles, propellant tanks and booster separation motors for ULA's vehicles.

When Vulcan was officially unveiled in April, Bruno said the rocket could be augmented by up to six solid-rocket boosters, giving it greater lift capability than the largest version of the Atlas 5 but not as much as the Delta 4 Heavy, which features three core stages in a side-by-side configuration.

ULA's selection of Orbital ATK would appear to be a loss for Aerojet Rocketdyne of Sacramento, California, which as the only other U.S. maker of large solid rocket boosters likely bid for the work.

Aerojet Rocketdyne makes liquid-fueled upper stage engines for the Atlas 5 and Delta 4 as well as the main engine for the Delta 4, but its relationship with Denver-based ULA has become strained over the latter's plan to use Blue Origin's planned BE-4 as Vulcan's first-stage engine. Aerojet Rocketdyne has proposed its AR1, which could be plugged in to the first stage of the Atlas 5, whose current Russian-built main engine is subject to a congressional ban for ULA's core national security launch market.

ULA continues to fund work on the AR1 as a backup option and says it will make a final decision next year. Meanwhile, Aerojet Rocketdyne has inquired about obtaining the rights to the Atlas 5 design and more recently offered to buy ULA from its parent companies, Boeing and Lockheed Martin, for $2 billion.

Boeing executives say the company is not interested in the offer, while Lockheed Martin has remained silent on the matter.

 

 © 2015 SpaceNews, Inc. All rights reserved.

 

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Mission costs too high---- nasaproblems.com

The following SLS/MPCV "operation" cost estimates were presented to the Congressional Budget Office after it failed to make the Congress aware of the prohibitive cost to operate expendable heavy lift vehicles.

·         The NASA human exploration budget will be flat lined at $2.8b for the foreseeable future. One report indicates a development cost of $38b and another reports that the first development version launch of the SLS could not take place until December 2017 and the 130mt production versions (crew and cargo) are not expected to unveiled until August 2032. This SLS development program scenario based on 13 flights over a 21 year period would have extreme difficulty maintaining the manufacturing labor force for such a low flight rate. However, it is the introduction of the cargo vehicle which forecast that it will require two launches of these mammoth vehicles to accomplish one mission. The SLS is the same heavy lift launcher concept used in the Constellation program which was cancelled because: "The U.S. human spaceflight program appears to be on an unsustainable trajectory. It is perpetuating the perilous practice of pursuing goals that do not match allocated resources." Such is the case today.

·        NASA has failed to reduce the mission operation cost of the SLS/MPCV. The following $4.2b estimate of annual operations cost for the SLS indicated it will cost more to manufacture the expendable vehicles, plan the mission, and conduct flight operation than NASA has budgeted for human exploration. NASA is assuming that future budgets will be increased to cover mission operations. THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN!

 "It's the Launch Cost…Stupid"… paraphrasing Bill Clinton's presidential economy election theme. NASA must reduce its launch cost and the commercial space shuttle is the only option! The SLS/MPCV shuttle replacement plan is unaffordable, unsafe, and like the Constellation program suffers from incompetent NASA management.

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Obama Trashes Space Program, Blames Congress | Frontpage Mag

It would have cost $5 billion to keep the Space Shuttle flying. The money that Obama threw away on Green Energy for Muslim tyrannies would have covered the cost of keeping a manned space program.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/point/259956/obama-trashes-space-program-blames-congress-daniel-greenfield

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The USA is being seriously damaged by not having this capability!

Lakecountyspaceport.com website Check it out!

Lake County SpacePort is a website dedicated to showcasing over 45-years worth of spacemodeling work, as well as providing insights of that work to others.

http://lakecountyspaceport.com/

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Fwd: Sadly, Another Keystone XL Anniversary

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Matt Koch, Institute for 21st Century Energy" <energyinstitute@uschamber.com>
Date: September 24, 2015 at 1:49:28 PM CDT
To: <Bobbygmartin1938@gmail.com>
Subject: Sadly, Another Keystone XL Anniversary

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Dear Friend, Seven years ago on September 19, the Keystone XL Pipeline permit request was submitted to the State Department.   Yes, you read that correctly -- it's the seventh anniversary.   This seven-year delay is not only unacceptable, it is unprecedented, and based purely on the politics of a vocal minority. The President has wasted another year, delaying a decision on a key piece of energy infrastructure that will create jobs, increase revenue, and which enjoys significant bipartisan support in Congress and throughout the county.     Americans know that the Keystone XL Pipeline will have a huge impact in Montana, South Dakota, and Nebraska, and will also benefit the entire country. To mark last year's 6th anniversary of the Keystone XL Pipeline permit application, the Energy Institute went on the Lost Opportunities Tour where we visited communities along pipeline route. It was evident that these communities understood the great long term job and economic opportunities that the pipeline would bring to them.   But don't take our word for it -- watch for yourself.   In his seven-year-long "deliberation," the President has also gravely overlooked our nation's energy security. The Keystone XL Pipeline would maintain a stable long-term supply of energy to fuel our economy all while keeping energy dollars here in North America. As a last reminder, all of these economic and security benefits can be gained from the Keystone XL Pipeline with virtually no increased environmental impact or risk. A decision on the Keystone XL Pipeline permit application is long overdue.  President Obama - the American people are ties of waiting.  Approve the Keystone XL Pipeline now! Sincerely, Matt Koch Vice President Institute for 21st Century Energy U.S. Chamber of Commerce

"U.S. CHAMBER" and "U.S. CHAMBER OF COMMERCE" are registered trademarks of the Chamber of  Commerce of the United States of America. This e-mail was sent by: U.S. Chamber of Commerce 1615 H Street, NW Washington, DC 20062-2000 This email was sent to: Bobbygmartin1938@gmail.com. Update your profile at your Profile Center Unsubscribe or Manage U.S. Chamber of Commerce Subscriptions.