Kalendarium historycznych wydarzeń

[Orionid]

25 lat temu 24 listopada 1991 rozpoczęła się 10. misja wahadłowca Atlantis http://lk.astronautilus.pl/loty/sts44.htm
Z uwagi na wojskowych charakter lotu wiele szczegółów wyprawy STS-44 zostało utajnionych.

Zwraca uwagę wymiana dowódcy wyprawy z powodu nietypowej sytuacji. Davidowi  Walkerowi http://lk.astronautilus.pl/astros/154.htm z uwagi na złamanie procedur w czasie niebezpiecznej sytuacji w powietrzu została zawieszona licencja na latanie T-38.

Po licznych opóźnieniach misja mogła się zacząć. Mimo skrócenia wyprawy o 3 dni ze względów technicznych była to jedna z najdłuższych misji dla Departamentu Obrony.  Zawiodła jedna z trzech inercyjnych jednostek  pomiarowych IMU-2 , która pełniła jedną z podstawowych  funkcji nawigacyjnych promu kosmicznego.

Do głównych zadań misji należało umieszczenie na orbicie 2380-kg satelity DSP, który został umieszczony na docelowej orbicie przy użyciu stopnia IUS (Inertial Upper Stage).

Lądowanie po raz ostatni odbyło się na dnie wyschniętego jeziora. W przyszłości do lądowań służyły  już tylko betonowe nawierzchnie pasów.

“Six”, that is, because STS-44 also included a unique final crewman: Tom Hennen, an Army chief warrant officer and a recognized expert in the fields of intelligence and surveillance. His task on the mission was to develop and operate a battery of experiments to assess the capabilities of professional imagery analysts to observe terrestrial targets from orbit. His payload, known as “Terra Scout,” included the Spaceborne Direct View Optical System (SPADVOS) and the Military Man in Space (M88-1). Hennen’s mission actually formed part of a broader umbrella of Department of Defense flights, which, in the pre-Challenger era, might have seen Air Force meteorologists, Army geologists, and geographers and Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) physicists fly aboard the shuttle.

These plans formed part of the Department of Defense’s Space Test Program (STP) and encompassed not only Terra Scout, but also “Terra View,” using cameras and binoculars to observe ground-based targets, and “Terra Geode,” employing specialized equipment to assess terrain suitability for tactical movements of troops. (...)

At length, in November 1991, the six-strong crew of STS-44 was ready to embark on an almost-10-day voyage into space. Theirs was expected to be the longest Department of Defense shuttle mission in history. In fact, with a targeted duration of nine days and 19 hours, Atlantis’ 10th orbital flight promised to be her own longest to date, entering third place as the longest shuttle mission at that time.

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96395

Amid this banter, fellow “rookie” Henricks noticed that Musgrave was strangely quiet.

“Story,” he asked, “how come you’re so quiet over there?”

From his seat directly behind and between Henricks and Gregory, Musgrave responded simply: “Because I’m scared to death!”

At that moment, the crew realized that if Musgrave—who had been an astronaut for almost 25 years and was ready for his fourth shuttle launch—was scared, then they ought to be so, too. It was time to get serious. At 6:44 p.m. EST, the shuttle’s three main engines roared to life, followed by the staccato crackle of the twin Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) and Atlantis rocketed into the dark Florida sky to begin her 10th mission. From his seat, Musgrave carried a small mirror, which provided him with a remarkable view of the nocturnal liftoff and the steadily decreasing perspective as the shuttle rose away from Pad 39A. (...)

Having thus accomplished their primary objective in spectacular fashion, the astronauts settled down for what was expected to be 10 days of military experiments. In addition to the Spaceborne Direct View Optical System (SPADVOS) and Military Man in Space (M88-1), a series of radiation and contamination monitors were located in the crew cabin and payload bay. Atlantis was used as a tracking target for the Air Force’s electro-optical sensors on the Hawaiian island of Maui, whilst thruster firings were observed by an ultraviolet plume detection instrument aboard the Naval Research Laboratory’s Low Power Atmospheric Compensation Experiment (LACE). Since STS-44 was planned to be one of the longest shuttle missions to date, a range of biomedical experiments were also aboard. Specifically, the astronauts used a lower-body negative pressure garment and drank heavily-salted water in the expectation that it would increase their ability to stand upright after spending so long in the weightless environment.

With the emphasis of much of the mission being on Earth observations, and coming only months after the devastating Mount Pinatubo eruption, the crew were able to make comments about significant changes in the atmosphere. Certainly, Gregory and Musgrave were vocal in their conviction that atmospheric pollution and thickening layers of haze had worsened in the two years since their last flight together. Cloud cover had also hampered a number of the SPADVOS and M88-1 experiments, although the crew were able to make useful observations, successfully counting the number of ships in the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and spotting crates aboard an oil tanker. From his perspective, Runco would later remark that the observations were of only marginal use for military surveillance purposes and Hennen—whose expertise in the field spanned more than 20 years—only managed to observe around a dozen of his 30 planned targets, partly due to bad weather and partly due to an event outside of anyone’s control. (...)

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96400#more-96400

[Orionid]

Nieudane loty transportowców do stacji orbitalnych  zostały zapoczątkowane 5 lat temu. Wcześniej przez 33 lata wszystkie tego typu starty skutkowały przycumowaniem do kompleksów orbitalnych. W ciągu 5. ostatnich lat doszło do  utraty 5. misji zaopatrzeniowych do ISS:

W 2011 Progress M-12M
W 2014 Cygnus-3 (CRS-3, SS Deke Slayton)
W 2015 Progress M-27M   i   Dragon SpX-7 (CRS-7)
W 2016 Progress MS-4.

W tym kontekście 5 nieudanych wypraw  pozwala się zastanawiać co by się stało, gdyby do podobnych sytuacji doszło w czasie startów załogowych. Wydaje się, że najbezpieczniej jest wtedy, kiedy do eksplozji rakiety dochodzi wówczas, kiedy jest jeszcze szansa użycia rakietowego systemu ratunkowego. A jeśli później dochodzi do eksplozji ?


Kolejna katastrofa!
  24.08. 2011 o 13:00:08,041 z Bajkonuru wystartowała RN Sojuz-U, która miała wynieść w T+8' 50" na orbitę
o parametrach: hp=192 km, ha=232 km, i=51,65° automatyczny statek transportowy Progress M-12M.
W T+325 sekund doszło do awarii i przerwania pracy silnika trzeciego stopnia rakiety. Jej pozostałości spadły
w rejonie czojskim republiki ałtajskiej (wschodnia Syberia).

29.09. komisja powypadkowa poinformowała, że przyczyną nieprawidłowej pracy silnika trzeciego stopnia
była awaria generatora gazu.

http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n110816.htm#05
http://kosmonauta.net/2011/08/2011-08-30-progress-iss/
http://www.russianspaceweb.com/progress_m12m.html


Katastrofa Antaresa!
  28.10.2014 o 22:22:40 z Wallops wystrzelona została RN Antares-130 (pierwszy lot wersji), która miała
wynieść w T+7' 27" na orbitę o parametrach: hp=206 km, ha=295 km, i=51,64° statek transportowy
Cygnus-3 (CRS-3, Cygnus Orb-3, SS Deke Slayton). Prócz tego wyniesione miały być pikosatelity do
obserwacji Ziemi Flock-1d (26 sztuk typu CubeSat-3U), RACE (Radiometer Atmospheric CubeSat
Experiment), GOMX-2 oraz Arkyd-3. W T+13 sekund na wysokości ok. 100 metrów doszło do
eksplozji w rejonie silników pierwszego stopnia i w T+22" rakieta spadła obok wyrzutni i eksplodowała,
uszkodzenia infrastruktury wyrzutni są niewielkie.

http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n141016.htm#09
http://kosmonauta.net/2014/10/rakieta-antares-eksplodowala-tuz-po-starcie/
http://kosmonauta.net/2015/11/raport-z-katastrofy-antaresa-opublikowany/
http://www.universetoday.com/116639/antares-orb-3-rocket-explosion-and-frightening-incineration-captured-by-up-close-launch-pad-videosphotos-pt-2/
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=71970
http://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=1941.0


Progress nie doleci do ISS
  28.04.2015 o 07:09:50,378 z Bajkonuru wystrzelona została rakieta nośna Sojuz-2.1a, która wyniosła w T+8' 45"
na orbitę o parametrach: hp=194 km, ha=279 km, i=51,67° (plan: hp=193 km +/-2 km, ha=238 km +/-5 km,
i=51,67° +/-00,3°) transportowy statek kosmiczny Progress M-27M. Jego połączenie z ISS miano wykonać
o 13:07, ale po wejściu na orbitę telemetria urwała się zaraz po rozłożeniu paneli baterii słonecznych i anten
łączności. Nie wiadomo, czy rozłożyły się wysięgniki obu anten radarowego systemu zbliżania Kurs, ani czy
zostało wytworzone ciśnienie robocze w systemie napędowym statku. Połączenie zostało wstępnie przeniesione
na 30.04. o 09:03, jednak jego warunkiem było przywrócenie telemetrii - co nie nastąpiło. Podczas seansu
łączności  na trzecim obiegu odebrano wideo z systemu zbliżania Kurs, które pokazało, że statek szybko
rotuje wzdłuż osi podłużnej (około 12 obrotów na minutę), co drastycznie zmniejszyło szanse na pomyślne
rozwiązanie problemu. Podjęta w nocy 28/29.04. próba ustabilizowania statku z pomocą systemu TORU nie
przyniosła rezultatu. Do tej chwili nie udało się odebrać żadnej dalszej telemetrii. Niekontrolowane wejście
statku w atmosferę będzie miało miejsce w okresie 07-11.05.2015, prawdopodobnie 08.05.2015.

JSpOC (Joint Space Operations Center) wydało oświadczenie, z którego wynika, że na pobliskich orbitach
zarejestrowała 44 odłamki, nie może jednak stwierdzić, czy pochodzą one z Progressa, czy z trzeciego stopnia
rakiety.

http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n150416.htm#04
http://kosmonauta.net/2015/05/final-nieudanej-misji-statku-progress-m-27m-w-atmosferze/
http://www.russianspaceweb.com/progress-m27m.html
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/05/soyuz-2-1a-third-stage-progress-m-27m-iss-changes/
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=82345
http://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=2125.0


Katastrofa Falcona
  28.06.2015 o 14:21:11 z Cape Canaveral wystrzelona została RN Falcon 9R v1.1, która miała wynieść w T+10'
na orbitę ISS automatyczny statek transportowy Dragon SpX-7 (CRS-7). Jednak w T+139 sekund doszło
do gwałtownego rozszczelnienia się zbiornika ciekłego tlenu drugiego stopnia rakiety, który eksplodował,
w konsekwencji niszcząc całą rakietę. W katastrofie zniszczeniu uległo też osiem satelitów serii Flock-1f oraz
adapter IDA-1.

http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n150616.htm#04
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/06/falcon-9-crs-7-dragon-commute-orbit/
http://kosmonauta.net/2015/06/relacja-ze-startu-dragon-crs-7/
http://kosmonauta.net/2016/07/katastrofa-crs-7-raport-nasa/


Progress nie doleciał do ISS
  01.12.2016 o 14:51:52,474 z Bajkonuru wystrzelona została RN Sojuz-U, która miała wynieść w T+8' 48"
na orbitę o planowanych parametrach: hp=183 km, ha=225 km, i=51,64° transportowy statek kosmiczny
Progress MS-4. Jego połączenie z ISS miało zostać wykonane 03.12.2016 o 16:43.

W T+382,3 sekund, krótko po rozpoczęciu pracy trzeciego stopnia doszło do utraty telemetrii. Rakieta,
znajdująca się wóczas na wysokości 181 km uległa awarii, jej szczątki spadły w autonomicznej Republice
Tuwy, 65 km na zachód od miasta Kyzył. Wstępne informacje mówią o awaryjnym wyłączeniu silnika
RD-0110 z powodu gwałtownej utraty orientacji. Mogło to być spowodowane przepaleniem jego komory
spalania.

http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n161201.htm#01
http://kosmonauta.net/2016/12/wystartowal-progress-ms-04/
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2016/12/roscosmos-progress-ms-0465p-to-station/
http://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=2718.0

[Orionid]

45 lat temu 2 grudnia 1971 lądownik Mars-3 jako pierwszy w historii dokonał miękkiego lądowania na powierzchni Czerwonej Planety. Przekaz danych został przerwany po 14,5 sekundy. Obraz przekazany na Ziemię był nieczytelny.

Czy odnaleziono lądownik Mars 3?
PRZEZ KRZYSZTOF KANAWKA W DNIU 12 KWIETNIA 2013

Wiele wskazuje na to, że MRO odszukał teraz ślady po radzieckiej misji Mars 3 z 1971 roku. Mars 3 była pierwszą udaną próbą lądowania na Czerwonej Planecie, co nastąpiło 2 grudnia 1971 roku o godzinie 13:25 UTC. Lądowanie się powiodło i nastąpiło w obszarze Marsa o koordynatach 45 stopni szerokości południowej i 158 stopni długości wschodniej, wewnątrz krateru Ptolemaeus. Tuż po lądowaniu Mars 3 rozpoczął pracę i zaczął przesyłanie zdjęcia powierzchni Czerwonej Planety. Niestety, zaledwie po 14,5 sekundach od lądowania Mars 3 zamilkł i już nigdy więcej się nie odezwał. Niemniej jednak w tym czasie zdążył przesłać część zdjęcia, którego jednak nie udało się prawidłowo zinterpretować. Czwarte zdjęcie w galerii tego artykułu przedstawia zdjęcie wykonane przez Mars 3 a trzecie – model tego lądownika. (...)

Co ciekawe, pierwsze zdjęcie wnętrza krateru Ptolemaeus, w którym wylądował Mars 3, wykonano już w 2007 roku, jednak długo trwała identyfikacja tego obrazu. Dopiero 31 grudnia zeszłego roku wybrano „obiecujących kandydatów” do sprzętu misji Mars 3. Najbardziej wyraźnym elementem sprzętu jest „kandydat” na spadochron, który ma około 7,5 metra średnicy. W pełni rozłożony spadochron misji Mars 3 miał średnicę 11 metrów, więc zaobserwowany twór rzeczywiście może być spadochronem, prawdopodobnie w poskręcanej formie. Podobnie i inne szczegóły, takie jak osłona termiczna czy ułożenie retrorakiet względem lądownika, sugerują, że to rzeczywiście może być sprzęt po misji Mars 3. (...)

Źródło: http://kosmonauta.net/2013/04/2013-04-12-mars-3/

The predicted Mars 3 landing site was at latitude 45 degrees south, longitude 202 degrees east, in Ptolemaeus Crater. HiRISE acquired a large image at this location in November 2007, and promising candidates for the hardware from Mars 3 were found on Dec. 31, 2012.

The candidate parachute is the most distinctive feature in the images (seen above at top.) It is an especially bright spot for this region, about 8.2 yards (7.5 meters) in diameter.

The parachute would have a diameter of 12 yards (11 meters) if fully spread out over the surface, so this is consistent.

http://www.universetoday.com/101397/soviet-lander-remains-spotted-by-mars-orbiter/
http://www.russianspaceweb.com/mars3_landing.html

[ekoplaneta]

2 grudnia 1971 udane lądowanie Mars 3. 2 grudnia 1999 nieudane lądowanie Mars Polar Landera...
Pomyśleć że Rosjanom w 1971 lądowanie poszło lepiej niż w 2016 Europejczykom 

[Orionid]

15 lat temu 5 grudnia 2001 wystartował do misji STS-108 ISS-UF-1 wahadłowiec Endeavour http://lk.astronautilus.pl/loty/sts108.htm . Był to 17 start Endeavoura do misji orbitalnej, a jednocześnie 12. lot wahadłowca  w kierunku ISS.

Celem wyprawy było dostarczenie zaopatrzenia na ISS oraz wymiana załóg Ekspedycji 3 i 4. Był to pierwszy start wahadłowca po atakach terrorystycznych na WTC w związku z czym podjęto szczególne środki ostrożności w czasie  przygotowań do startu.
Moduł MPLM znalazł się po raz czwarty na orbicie, a  MPLM Raffaello po raz drugi dostarczył zaopatrzenie dla ISS.

That “freedom” had, however, not come without cost. Security around the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida in the fall of 2001 had been significantly heightened and the rollout of the STS-108 stack from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) to Pad 39B on 31 October was accompanied by F-15 fighters, as well as an almost unprecedented communications blackout. Not until Endeavour was physically “hard-down” on the launch pad did NASA formally announce that the rollout had occurred. KSC Director Roy Bridges wanted to impose the kind of secrecy unseen since the classified Department of Defense shuttle missions of the mid-to-late 1980s and early 1990s, but this was considered unnecessary, in view of the fact that STS-108’s target launch date of 29 November was already in the public domain. Four days before launch, the crew arrived at the Cape, aboard five T-38 Talon jets, and touched down on the Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF). (...)

As part of efforts to remember the lives lost in the atrocities, Endeavour carried 6,000 small U.S. flags, part of the “Flags for Heroes and Families” campaign, spearheaded by NASA Administrator Dan Goldin. In October 2001, he announced that the flags would be flown into space and later presented to the victims’ families and survivors of the attacks. Goldin noted that the campaign was “a way for us to honor and show our support for the thousands of brave men and women who have selflessly contributed to the relief and recovery efforts,” as well as providing “a patriotic symbol of our strength and solidarity and our Nation’s resolve to prevail.” (...)

Their primary payload was Italy’s Raffaello Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM), making its second orbital flight after STS-100. This cylindrical module, 21 feet (6.4 meters) long and 15 feet (4.6 meters) in diameter, weighed about 9,000 pounds (4,000 kg) and on STS-108 would transport around 6,000 pounds (2,700 kg) of equipment, crew supplies, and scientific payloads uphill. Specifically, Raffaello housed eight Resupply Stowage Racks (RSRs) and four Resupply Stowage Platforms (RSPs) to augment existing ISS systems and the space station’s spare parts inventory. Raffaello would bring around 4,400 pounds (2,000 kg) of experiment samples, trash, and broken equipment back to Earth. (...)
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96665

As they approached the Florida spaceport, they were momentarily dismayed by the accumulation of clouds over the landing site. Finally breaking through the cloud deck at 5,500 feet (1,670 meters), whilst traveling at 345 mph (555 km/h), they spotted the runway, dead ahead. Kelly pressed the button to deploy Endeavour’s landing gear at an altitude of about 300 feet (90 meters) and all six wheels were down and locked into position by 200 feet (60 meters). Touchdown occurred at 12:55 p.m. EST, with the main gear hitting the runway at 230 mph (370 km/h) and Endeavour rolled smoothly to a halt.

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96763
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/archives/sts-108.html

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/search.cgi

[Orionid]

10 lat temu 10 grudnia 2006 wystartował po raz 33. wahadłowiec Discovery z misją STS-116 ISS-12A.1/Celsius.
http://lk.astronautilus.pl/loty/sts116.htm
Jednym z zadań misji była rozbudowa ISS o element ITS P5 ( ITS P5 to pierwszy z tzw. modułów łącznikowych, służący do uzyskania przedłużenia kratownicowej struktury stacji, na której opiera się system potężnych paneli słonecznych. ITS P5 zainstalowany został do ITS P3/P4 w ramach lotu montażowego 12A.1. Ten minimoduł połączył  ITS P3/P4 oraz ITS P6. https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Truss_Structure).

Przygotowania do misji zaczęły się jeszcze przed katastrofą Columbii. Skład załogi uległ modyfikacji.

From the left (front row) are European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Reiter, Nicholas J. M. Patrick, Joan E. Higginbotham, all STS-116 mission specialists; and William A. (Bill) Oefelein, STS-116 pilot. From the left (center row) are astronaut Robert L. Curbeam, Jr., European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Christer Fuglesang, STS-116 mission specialists; and astronaut Mark L. Polansky, STS-116 commander. From the left (back row) are astronaut Michael E. Lopez-Alegria, Expedition 14 commander and NASA space station science officer; cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin, Expedition 14 flight engineer representing Russia's Federal Space Agency; and astronaut Sunita L. Williams,

Also aboard for STS-116 would be a Shuttle Rotating Expedition Crewmember (ShREC). NASA astronaut Sunita Williams would fly to the ISS to begin a six-month increment, whilst Germany’s Thomas Reiter—flying on behalf of the European Space Agency (ESA)—would take her seat for the return to Earth, wrapping up 5.5 months in orbit. “Probably the most significant thing for us to exchange Thomas Reiter for Suni Williams is that we’re back in business,” said Curbeam before the flight. “This is how we intended to do business.”
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96930

With EVA-4 planned for 18 December, the joint crews spent the previous day preparing for what would earn Curbeam a new record for having performed as many as four spacewalks during a single shuttle flight. Four EVAs had been performed during the final Skylab mission between November 1973 and February 1974 and as many as five discrete  “extravehicular” sessions could be recorded for the Apollo 15, 16, and 17 lunar voyages, when one counts a “Stand-Up EVA” and brief periods of cabin depressurization to discard equipment onto the Moon’s surface. However, no previous astronaut had ever performed as many as four spacewalks from the shuttle. Even today, only Scott Parazynski has tied with Curbeam in having completed a quartet of EVAs on a single shuttle flight.

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=96999
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/its.html#.WE5AddThDwc
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/sts116/main/index.html

As seen through windows on the aft flight deck of Space Shuttle Discovery, a Department of Defense pico-satellite known as Atmospheric Neutral Density Experiment (ANDE) is released from the shuttle's payload bay by STS-116 crewmembers. ANDE consists of two micro-satellites which will measure the density and composition of the low Earth orbit (LEO) atmosphere while being tracked from the ground. The data will be used to better predict the movement of objects in orbit.

European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Christer Fuglesang, STS-116 mission specialist, participates in the mission's second of three planned sessions of extravehicular activity (EVA) as construction resumes on the International Space Station. Astronaut Robert L. Curbeam, Jr. (out of frame), mission specialist, also participated in the spacewalk.

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/search.cgi

[Orionid]

50 lat temu 22 grudnia 1966 ogłoszono skład załogi misji AS-205/208. Miało dojść do dwóch startów Saturna 1B. Jeden miał wynieść załogę na orbitę, a drugi LM. Do startów mogło dojść w sierpniu 1967.

Załoga poleciała ostatecznie na orbitę Saturnem V dopiero 3 marca 1969. Był to też pierwszy raz, kiedy razem z załogą nastąpił start LM. Także był to pierwszy start Saturna V z załogą.

(...) On 22 December 1966, McDivitt, Scott and Schweickart were announced as the prime crew for AS-205/208, which it was expected would fly as the “new” Apollo 2 on the D mission. In view of the intensive rendezvous commitment, their backups would be all-veterans Tom Stafford, John Young, and Gene Cernan. It was noted that Apollo 2 was expected to be launched “during 1967,” possibly in the August timeframe, but would “depend on the success of other Apollo missions, including AS-204.” McDivitt’s crew would launch aboard their Block II CSM, via a Saturn IB booster, after which the LM would launch atop a second Saturn IB, about 24 hours later.

The AS-205/208 dual nomenclature is interesting. At first, Schirra, Eisele, and Cunningham would have ridden the AS-205 Saturn IB vehicle, but after their Apollo 2 flight was canceled, the situation changed. McDivitt’s crew—originally earmarked to fly their CSM to orbit atop the AS-207 Saturn IB for the D mission—were reassigned to launch into low-Earth orbit atop the AS-205 booster. A second Saturn IB, launched 24 hours later, and designated “AS-208,” would transport the unmanned Lunar Module (LM)-2 into low-Earth orbit. The crew would rendezvous, dock and extract LM-2 from the S-IVB second stage of the Saturn IB. McDivitt and Schweickart would then transfer from the CSM to the LM and undock to perform a series of tests of the lunar lander’s descent and ascent engines. Finally, they would redock with Scott in the CSM, jettison the lander, and return to Earth after a mission lasting approximately five days. “The LM was especially tricky,” wrote astronaut Mike Collins in his autobiography, Carrying the Fire, “because once McDivitt and Schweickart got in it and separated from Scott in the command module, they had to get back, having no heat shield on their frail craft, and therefore being unable to return to Earth separately without burning up.” (...)

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=97254

(...) Had Apollo 3 flown as intended, close parallels could be drawn with the inaugural Exploration Flight Test (EFT)-1 mission of NASA’s Orion spacecraft in December 2014. But of course the dual-launch of AS-205/208 and the high-apogee test flight of AS-503 did not come to pass—at least not in their original incarnation. Within weeks of the Apollo 1 fire the crews were disbanded, and it was not until 20 November 1967 that further announcements were made by NASA. The McDivitt and Borman crews remained intact, with some adjustments to their backup crews, but the most notable change was a shift in the AS-205/208 mission configuration. Rather than flying the CSM and LM atop two separate Saturn IBs, McDivitt, Scott, and Schweickart would fly the entire spacecraft to low-Earth orbit in the fall of 1968 … on the first piloted voyage of the Saturn V. Meanwhile, Borman’s high-apogee mission with Collins and Anders would then take place in early 1969.

However, 1968 proved a changeable year. With CIA intelligence reports hinting that the Soviets were positioning themselves for a piloted lunar-orbital mission of their own, efforts entered high gear to bring Apollo into operations and deliver on the late President John F. Kennedy’s goal. In the spring of 1968, Apollo officials at the Manned Spacecraft Center (MSC) in Houston, Texas, were trying to upgrade the E-mission into something called “E-prime,” which would move the mission to the vicinity of the Moon. Instead of peaking at 4,000 miles (6,400 km), there were discussions of increasing the apogee of Borman’s crew to 240,000 miles (370,000 km)—effectively a circumlunar voyage. Before this could be concluded, in July 1968, Mike Collins was playing handball and realized that his legs did not seem to be functioning as they should. The condition worsened, with buckling knees, tingling, and numbness; a doctor’s examination led to a referral to a neurologist, who diagnosed a bony growth between his fifth and sixth cervical vertebrae, pushing against his spinal column. Surgery was the only option, which forced Collins to relinquish his position on Borman’s mission. (...)

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=97301

[JSz]

Jutro minie dokładnie 50 lat od miękkiego lądowania na Księżycu bezzałogowego lądownika Łuna 13 (24 grudnia 1996). Było to drugie udane radzieckie lądowanie na Księżycu (po Łunie 9: 3 lutego 1966), a trzecie w ogóle (po drodze był jeszcze Surveyor 1: 2 czerwca 1966).




http://www.russianspaceweb.com/luna13.html
https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%81una_13

[Orionid]

Dwadzieścia lat temu trwał trzeci długotwały lot astronauty amerykańskiego na Mirze. John Blaha http://lk.astronautilus.pl/astros/212.htm  stał się też pierwszym z sześciu dowódców wahadłowca, którzy odbyli długotrwałe misje kosmiczne na pokładzie stacji orbitalnych i drugim Amerykaninem spędzającym Boże Narodzenie na pokładzie kompleksu orbitalnego.

Początkowo John Blaha miał  odbyć długotrwałą wyprawę w towarzystwie Giennadija Manakowa i Pawła Winogradowa. Jednak na krótko przed startem u Manakowa odkryto problemy z sercem i kosmonauta został hospitalizowany. Walerij Korzun i Aleksandr Kaleri stanowili załogę zapasową.

Na Mirze  eksperymenty były rozdzielone na amerykańskie i rosyjskie i nie było praktycznie wiele możliwości spotkań Amerykanina z rosyjskimi członkami załogi, którzy byli bardzo obciążeni pracą. Normą był siedmiodniowy tydzień pracy.

In his NASA oral history, Blaha described himself, self-deprecatingly, as “a piece of luggage.” This carried the potential for a strange relationship, since he had far more up-front shuttle experience—both from a piloting and commanding perspective—than any of his STS-79 or STS-81 crewmates.

But Readdy proved charming in that he fully integrated Blaha into the STS-79 crew. “He took us in,” he remembered, “even though we were only with the crew for about three weeks prior to launch and made us feel like we were just part of the crew with everything that happened. I didn’t really deserve anything, since I hadn’t done anything.” Jokingly, Blaha described himself as “worse than a payload specialist”—hierarchically the lowest-ranking member of a shuttle crew—and more than once stressed the “piece of luggage” comparison. By the late summer of 1996, he had not been directly involved with shuttle operations for more than 2.5 years.

http://www.americaspace.com/?p=95714

In his book Dragonfly, Bryan Burrough touched on the effect of this late crew-swap upon Blaha, who would be spending four months in space with two cosmonauts that he barely knew. He learned of the swap on 9 August, whilst at home in Houston, Texas, but upon his return to the Star City training center, near Moscow, a few days later, Korzun and Kaleri invited him out to dinner and made their introductions. Together with André-Deshays, Korzun and Kaleri roared to orbit on 17 August and docked with Mir two days later. For two weeks, they worked with Shannon Lucid and her Russian crewmates Yuri Onufrienko and Yuri Usachev. Finally, Onufrienko, Usachev, and André-Deshays returned to Earth, leaving Korzun, Kaleri, and Lucid aboard Mir until the arrival of STS-79 and Blaha.

Throughout the fall of 1996, Blaha sampled mammalian cartilage cells, grew crystals of two separate alloys, and took microbial specimens from throughout the expansive space station. He battled other BTS glitches and continued his monitoring of dwarf wheat seedlings in the greenhouse, regularly planting new crops. By his own admission, he rarely saw Korzun and Kaleri in the station’s warren-like maze of modules. “Every now and then, I would do something with one of the cosmonauts,” he said later. “Maybe there were 15-20 times in that four months. The reason was we all were too busy. We couldn’t be together. All three of us had to working on things to accomplish all the work.”

That said, Blaha managed to watch movies to help him sleep at night and he utilized ham radio to communicate with other operators on Earth. These provided an essential psychological crutch. “All three of us were busy, from eight in the morning until ten in the evening,” he remembered. Korzun and Kaleri worked even later, often until midnight. “I quit at ten or ten-thirty, if I could,” continued Blaha, “so that I could wind down and get a good night’s sleep. I never just watched them do stuff, because I never had any time to do that. I was busy with all the things I was doing, which predominantly was the science experiments.” Seven-day working weeks were the norm.

In December, Blaha became the first American to spend Christmas in space since the Skylab era. In a news conference, Korzun described the crew’s Christmas menu as “outstanding,” with traditional cakes and dishes, including lamb, pork, and desserts, together with Italian foodstuffs and cheeses.
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=95722

[Orionid]

Obchody świąt Bożego Narodzenia w kosmosie mają długą tradycję, a zaczęło się  od wyprawy Apollo 8, w  czasie której krążąc po orbicie wokół Księżyca załoga odczytała wersy Księgi Rodzaju i przesłała mieszkańcom Ziemi świąteczne pozdrowienia.

This near-vertical photograph from the Apollo 8 spacecraft covers an area of approximately 50 x 50 statute miles within a 250-statute-miles-in-diameter crater on the lunar farside. The center of this large crater is located at about 157 degrees west longitude and 4 degrees south latitude. The large crater in the center of the picture is about 20 statute miles in diameter.

Następna taka okazja zdarzyła się w czasie misji Skylab-4, która odbywała się na przełomie lat 1973/1974.
Przebiegała ona pod znakiem komety  Kohoutka i obserwacji Słońca. Co ciekawe w tym czasie  na orbicie przebywali  rosyjscy kosmonauci z załogi Sojuza-13. Jednak   Boże Narodzenie na terenie Związku Radzieckiego przypada wg kalendarza juliańskiego 7 stycznia. Wtedy święto nie było uznawane przez ówczesny system.
Od 1987 na orbicie wokółziemskiej stale w czasie świąt Bożego Narodzenia przebywają ludzie. Od 1999 dotyczy to Amerykanów. Wtedy trwała trzecia misja serwisowa Kosmicznego Teleskopu Hubble’a.
Przedstawicielem trzeciego narodu, który zapoczątkował przebywanie w kosmosie w okresie tych świąt został Niemiec
Thomas Reiter w grudniu 1995.
Obecnie po raz 17. jest na ISS obchodzone Boże Narodzenie.
Pierwszym Amerykaninem, który spędził 3 razy Boże narodzenie poza Ziemią jest Scott Kelly http://lk.astronautilus.pl/astros/390.htm
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=89401
http://www.americaspace.com/?p=89520

Five years later, in December 1973, Americans and Russians spent Christmas—at least, Christmas according to the newer Gregorian Calendar—in orbit, with astronauts Gerry Carr, Ed Gibson, and Bill Pogue aboard Skylab and Soviet cosmonauts Pyotr Klimuk and Valentin Lebedev flying a solo mission on Soyuz 13. Russian Orthodox Christmas, of course, occurs on 7 January, under the traditional framework of the older Julian Calendar, but within the Soviet Union its observance was officially suppressed by the Communist authorities and little has come to light over whether Klimuk or Lebedev made any reference to the Gregorian festivities. Nor was it possible for the Skylab and Soyuz crews to speak via radio during their respective missions.

Aboard Skylab, the three astronauts were six weeks into a record-breaking 84-day flight and had crafted a makeshift Christmas tree from packing material, food containers, and crude ornaments. They even made a small, long-tailed star from silver foil and put in pride of place atop the tree, to honor Comet Kohoutek, which made an appearance in Earth’s skies during late 1973 and early 1974. On Christmas Day itself, Carr and Pogue performed a spacewalk outside Skylab, one of whose objectives was to photograph Kohoutek. In his interview for the NASA oral historian, Pogue remembered floating in the station’s airlock, surrounded by his cameras, two large film magazines for the Apollo Telescope Mount (ATM), and other tools. “Gerry went hand-over-hand to the end of the solar observatory,” Pogue related, “while I got the replacement film magazines ready. I operated an extendable boom to transfer the first film canister to Gerry; he removed it and loaded the exposed canister to the boom; I retracted the boom while Gerry loaded the fresh canister to replace the one he had just removed and when he gave me the okay, I sent the second canister out. We repeated the procedure and were finished in record time.” (...)

Over the next two decades, several cosmonaut crews were in orbit for both the Gregorian and Julian Christmases, beginning with Soyuz 26, crewed by Yuri Romanenko and Georgi Grechko. They launched from Baikonur on 10 December 1977 and returned to Earth in mid-March of the following year, surpassing the record of Carr’s crew by spending 96 days in orbit. And 10 years after that, in December 1987, Yuri Romanenko became the first person to spend two Christmases (Gregorian, at least) in orbit, as he closed out a 326-day voyage aboard Mir. Joining him were fellow cosmonauts Aleksandr Aleksandrov, Anatoli Levchenko, Vladimir Titov, and Musa Manarov. In fact, from Christmas 1987 onwards, at least one human being would be off the planet during each festive period. (...)

During this decade of festive periods in space, Manarov became the first person to spend two Julian and Gregorian Christmases aloft, whilst Russia’s Yelena Kondakova became the first woman to spend the holiday off the planet in December 1994 and Germany’s Thomas Reiter became the first non-Russian and non-U.S. citizen to do so in December 1995. From the middle of the 1990s, with the beginning of the shuttle-Mir program, the opportunities for Americans opened and in December 1996 veteran shuttle commander John Blaha became the first U.S. astronaut since Skylab to celebrate Christmas in space.

In one of his Letters Home, dated 13 December, Blaha described one of the harbingers of the holidays, as an unmanned Progress supply craft, carrying much-needed food, equipment, and gifts and cards from home, approached Mir for docking. “I was in the Kvant-2 module, looking through one of the small windows,” Blaha wrote. “I finally saw the Progress. It was a shining star, rising towards us at great speed from beneath the horizon. All of a sudden, the light from the Progress extinguished as we passed into the shade of the Earth. Five seconds later, four lights on the Progress were turned on. I watched the remainder of the rendezvous through a tiny window in the aft end of the Kvant module.” For Blaha and his Russian crewmates, Valeri Korzun and Aleksandr Kaleri, opening the Progress “was like Christmas and your birthday, all rolled together, when you are five years old.” They found themselves reading mail, laughing, opening presents and eating fresh tomatoes and cheese. “It was an experience I will always remember,” Blaha once said. (...)
Część pierwsza artykułu  http://www.americaspace.com/?p=97347
http://www.space.com/13809-photos-space-holidays-astronauts-christmas.html

(11 Jan. 1974) --- This color photograph of the comet Kohoutek was taken by members of the lunar and planetary laboratory photographic team from the University of Arizona, at the Catalina Observatory with a 35mm camera on Jan. 11, 1974.

(19 Dec. 1973) --- This photograph of the sun, taken on Dec. 19, 1973, during the third and final manned Skylab mission (Skylab 4), shows one of the most spectacular solar flares ever recorded, spanning more than 588,000 kilometers (365,000 miles) across the solar surface.

(25 December 1999) --- Moments after the freeing of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) by Discovery's remote manipulator system (RMS), astronauts in the shuttle's cabin took a series of electronic stills of the giant observatory. This picture was taken just two seconds after the previous frame.

(21 December 1999) --- Full Moon, as photographed by the STS-103 crew aboard Discovery about three hours before rendezvous with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). HST appears as a tiny dot above and to left of the Moon. The picture was taken with an electronic still camera (ESC) at 15:22:41 GMT Dec. 21, 1999.

[Orionid]

część 2 artykułu: http://www.americaspace.com/?p=97351

The first crew to put up decorations aboard the ISS were the Expedition 1 crew—Commander Bill Shepherd of NASA and Russian cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev—who were about eight weeks into their five-month increment on the big day. For them, Christmas was a busy time, since an unpiloted Progress cargo craft had been undocked a few weeks earlier and inserted into a close “parking orbit” to allow Russian flight controllers to correct a software glitch with its automatic rendezvous system. On 26 December 2000, Gidzenko guided the Progress to a smooth docking at the rear port of the station’s Zvezda service module. Despite the work, the three men managed to enjoy a quiet Christmas, opening presents, talking to their families, eating rehydrated turkey and receiving Christmas greetings from NASA Administrator Dan Goldin.

[mss]

Obecnie po raz 17. jest na ISS obchodzone Boże Narodzenie

Interesujące, jest że do tej pory 96 astronautów miało okazję spędzać Boże Narodzenie w locie orbitalnym.
Dokładnie 16 razy przebywał w kosmosie człowiek w okresie Bożego Narodzenia do czasów MSK, w tym
jednocześnie z ZSRR (Sojuz 13) i USA (Skylab 4) w 1973 roku. Najliczniej było podczas misji STS-103,
kiedy to 5 astronautów z USA, 1 z  Francji i 1 ze Szwajcarii było w kosmosie w czasie świąt, czyli razem 7-miu.
Był to jedyny przypadek w czasie całego programu wahadłowca (1981-2011).

Załączam fotkę załogi z tej misji!

Za tydzień ma być opisany w tym serwisie świętowanie Nowego Roku na orbicie.
Dla chcących poczytać podaję 2 linki z alfabetycznym wykazem astronautów, którzy spędzali Sylwestra w kosmosie:
http://space.kursknet.ru/cosmos/english/other/new_year.sht
oraz wykaz alfabetyczny astronautów, którzy spędzali swoje urodziny na orbicie:
http://space.kursknet.ru/cosmos/english/other/birthday.sht.

[mss]

Fotoalbum Christmas in Space 

[Orionid]

26 grudnia 2016 przypadła setna rocznica urodzin Nikołaja Fiodorowicza Kuzniecowa, który w latach 1963 – 1972 kierował Centrum Przygotowań Kosmonautów. Wtedy został zainicjowany program stacji kosmicznej.
 
http://www.gctc.ru/main.php?id=3688

[astropl]

26 grudnia 2016 przypadła setna rocznica urodzin Nikołaja Kuzniecowa, który w latach 1963 – 1972 kierował Centrum Przygotowań Kosmonautów.

Komuś pomylili się różni Kuzniecowowie - Nikołaj Dmitrjewicz z Nikołajem Fiodorowiczem...