| T.R | Title | User | Personal
Name | Date | Lines |
|---|
| 550.1 | More Info | VOSTOK::LEPAGE | Truth travels slowly | Tue Aug 01 1989 15:00 | 165 |
|
I went through my references on lunar and planetary probes and
found a couple of probes missing from the list as well as some incorrect
information.
Probes Not Included in 550.0
Launch Date Name Weight Country Mission/Status
(Kg)
Nov 1, 1962 Mars 1 893 USSR Mars probe; failed en route
Nov 30, 1964 Zond 2 890? USSR Venus probe; failed en route
Jul 1, 1966 Explorer 33 93 US Lunar orbiter; failed to enter
lunar orbit. Now in Earth orbit
Jul 19, 1967 Explorer 35 104 US Lunar orbiter. Took field &
particle data
Mar 2, 1968 Zond 4 5600? USSR Zond test flight in cislunar
space. Now in solar orbit(?)
Aug 17, 1970 Venera 7 1180 USSR Successfully landed on Venus
Corrections to 550.0
"Luna 4" The "Luna 4" listed launched on April 12, 1960 was a Luna
launch failure and received no "Luna" designation.
Luna 4 Unsuccessful lunar landing attempt. Now in solar orbit.
Venera 4,5,6 Atmospheric probes returned data until crushed by pressure.
Luna 15 Unsuccessful sample return attempt. Crashed during landing.
Mars 2 Lander crashed. Orbiter returned data until Aug 1972.
Mars 3 Lander successfully landed but only returned data for 110
seconds. Orbiter returned data until Aug 1972.
Luna 18 Unsuccessful sample return attempt. Crashed during landing.
Mars 4 Failed to enter Mars orbit. Now in solar orbit.
Mars 6 Lander failed during descent. Carrier in solar orbit.
Mars 7 Lander missed Mars. Carrier and lander in solar orbit.
Luna 22 Weight estimated as 5600 Kg. Successfully entered lunar orbit.
Venera 9 Weight announced as 4936 Kg.
Venera 10 Weight announced as 5033 Kg.
Venera 13-16, Vega 1 & 2, Phobos 1 & 2
Weights estimated at 5000 Kg.
Magellan Weighed 3545 Kg.
I should note that I found several variations in the probe weights
in the list. Most amounted to only a couple of kilograms. In the case of
the Surveyor lunar landers, the weight given is that of the lander alone.
Their launch weight (which is what is given in the rest of the list) was
typically about 900 kilograms.
To make this list totally complete, I am listing below all the known
FAILURES of lunar and planetary probes.
Known Lunar and Planetary Probe Failures
Launch Date Name Weight Country Mission/Status
(Kg)
May 1, 1958? Unannounced 350? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Jun 25, 1958? Unannounced 350? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Aug 17, 1958 Project Able 1 38 US Lunar orbiter; launch failure
Sep 24, 1958? Unannounced 350? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Oct 11, 1958 Pioneer 1 38 US Lunar orbiter attempt; reached
altitude of 70,700 miles
Nov 8, 1958 Pioneer 2 39 US Lunar orbiter attempt; reached
altitude of 965 miles
Nov 15, 1958? Unannounced 350? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Dec 6, 1958 Pioneer 3 6 US Lunar fly-by attempt; reached
altitude of 63,580 miles
Jan 9, 1959? Unannounced 375? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Jun 16, 1959? Unannounced 375? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Nov 26, 1959 Atlas Able IV 169 US Lunar orbiter; launch failure
Apr 12, 1960? Unannounced 375? USSR Lunar probe; launch failure
Sep 25, 1960 Atlas Able 5A 176 US Lunar orbiter; launch failure
Oct 10, 1960 Unannounced 640? USSR Mars probe; launch failure
Oct 14, 1960 Unannounced 640? USSR Mars probe; launch failure
Dec 15, 1960 Atlas Able 5B 176 US Lunar orbiter; launch failure
Feb 4, 1961 Sputnik 7 640? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Jul 22, 1962 Mariner 1 202 US Venus fly-by; launch failure
Aug 25, 1962 Unannounced 890? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Sep 1, 1962 Unannounced 890? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Sep 12, 1962 Unannounced 890? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Oct 24, 1962 Unannounced 890? USSR Mars probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Nov 4, 1962 Unannounced 890? USSR Mars probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Jan 4, 1963 Unannounced 1400? USSR Lunar lander; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Feb 3, 1963? Unannounced 1400? USSR Lunar lander; launch failure
Nov 11, 1963 Kosmos 21 950? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Feb 27, 1964 Unannounced 950? USSR Venus probe; launch failure
Mar 4, 1964 Unannounced 950? USSR Venus probe; launch failure
Mar 26, 1964 Kosmos 27 950? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Apr 9, 1964 Unannounced 1425? USSR Lunar lander; launch failure
Mar 12, 1965 Kosmos 60 1470? USSR Lunar lander; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Nov 23, 1965 Kosmos 96 960? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Mar 1, 1966 Kosmos 111 1600? USSR Lunar orbiter; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Mar 10, 1967 Kosmos 146 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe; failed to
leave Earth oparking orbit
Mar 27, 1967 Unannounced 950? USSR Mars probe; launch failure
Apr 8, 1967 Kosmos 154 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe; failed to
leave Earth parking orbit
Jun 17, 1967 Kosmos 167 1100? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Nov 22, 1967 Unannounced 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe; launch
failure
Apr 22, 1968 Unannounced 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe; launch
failure
Jan 5, 1969? Unannounced 5600? USSR Circumlunar probe; launch
failure
Mar 27, 1969 Unannounced 3200? USSR Mars probe; launch failure
Apr 15, 1969 Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch
failure
Jun 12, 1969 Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch
failure
Aug 27, 1969 Pioneer E 67 US Solar probe; launch failure
Sep 23, 1969 Kosmos 300 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; failed
to leave Earth parking orbit
Oct 22, 1969 Kosmos 305 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; failed
to leave Earth parking orbit
Feb 19, 1970? Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch
failure
Dec 2, 1970 Kosmos 382 5600? USSR Cricumlunar probe(?); failed
to leave Earth parking orbit
May 8, 1971 Mariner 8 1031 US Mars orbiter; launch failure
May 10, 1971 Kosmos 419 4650? USSR Mars orbiter/lander; failed
to leave Earth parking orbit
Mar 31, 1972 Kosmos 482 1180? USSR Venus probe; failed to leave
Earth parking orbit
Oct 13, 1975? Unannounced 5600? USSR Lunar sample return; launch
failure
References:
"STL Space Log" September, 1961
"Robot Explorers" (1972) by Kenneth Gatland
"Handbook of Soviet Lunar and Planetary Exploration" (1979)
by Nicholas L. Johnson
"The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Space Technology" (1981) by Kenneth Gatland
"The Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Universe" (1983) by Richard S. Lewis
"Nauka I Chelovechestvo 1985: Skvos Oblaka Venera" (1985)
"Soviet Space Program 1980-1985" (1987) by Nicholas L. Johnson
"The Manned Soviet Space Program" (1988) by Pillip Clark
Enjoy,
Drew
|
| 550.2 | Why more Soviet failures? | STAR::KOHLS | No comment. | Tue Aug 01 1989 15:32 | 10 |
|
re .1
The Soviets obviously have had many more failures than the US. I
wonder if we can attribute this to better equipment on our part, or
more efforts on their part.
-SK
|
| 550.3 | Some more Soviet probes not listed | CLIPR::KLAES | N = R*fgfpneflfifaL | Tue Aug 01 1989 15:44 | 66 |
| Another Mars probe mission in 1960 was not admitted officially by
the Soviets to have existed until 1989, even though increasing rumors
had been spread about it during the intervening decades. This probe
not only failed to reach Earth orbit, it caused death and serious
destruction on the ground. According to a press release by the Soviet
weekly magazine OGONYOK in April of 1989, a third Mars probe was to be
launched on October 24 when trouble with the rocket booster occurred:
An electrical defect in the rocket had created a fuel leak.
The Soviet official in charge of the Mars project, Field Marshall
Mitrofan Nedelin, Commander in Chief of the Strategic Rocket Forces, no
doubt under considerable stress from Kruschev and the rapidly closing
launch "window" (a launch window is the period of time when Earth and
Mars are so aligned in their solar orbits that a relatively large
payload can be sent using the least amount of rocket energy, saving
both time and fuel), hurriedly attempted to solve the problem and went
out with rocket technicians onto the launch pad without emptying the
rocket of fuel first, a standard safety precaution. As the workers
were installing an electrical distributor, the action somehow gave a
command to ignite the rocket's second stage. The rocket flames burned
through to the first stage, which ignited the rocket fuel and created a
tremendous explosion, killing Nedelin and dozens (possibly hundreds) of
technicians and other personnel, also destroying the launch pad. The
OGONYOK article essentially confirmed what had been reported about the
incident over the past years.
In 1969, two (and possibly three) spacecraft of the new Soviet
Mars exploration series were launched. Weighing far more than any
earlier Mars craft (approximately 3,500 kilograms/7,700 pounds), they
were sent aloft on the powerful D-1-e (PROTON) rocket booster. These
probes most likely consisted of a flyby bus which would drop a lander
on the Martian surface as the bus headed on into solar orbit.
Unfortunately these latest spacecraft were plagued by old technical
problems: MARS 1969A, launched March 27, was destroyed on its way
into an Earth parking orbit when the PROTON booster exploded in
mid-flight. MARS 1969B, launched on April 14, may have been destroyed
in the same manner as its sister probe, as it too never achieved Earth
orbit. A third member of this set, MARS 1969C, reportedly never even
left the launch pad at Tyuratam, for reasons which are still unknown.
The following year, the Soviets began conducting tests in space
in an attempt to avoid the problems of their past Mars missions. In
November and December of 1970, COSMOS 379 and 382 conducted a series
of various maneuvers in Earth orbit which would later be learned by the
West as being tests of an improved rocket insertion system, designed to
place the new Mars probes on course to their target planet. These tests
were apparently successful in accomplishing their tasks.
Some other books dealing with planetary probes:
Hart, Douglas, THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SOVIET SPACECRAFT, Exeter Books,
New York, 1987. ISBN 0-671-08932-3.
Miles, Frank, and Nicholas Booth, RACE TO MARS: THE MARS FLIGHT
ATLAS, Harper and Row, Publishers, New York, 1988. ISBN 0-06-016005-5.
Oberg, James E., UNCOVERING SOVIET DISASTERS: EXPLORING THE LIMITS
OF GLASNOST, Random House, Inc., New York, 1988. ISBN 0-394-56095-7.
Smith, Arthur, PLANETARY EXPLORATION: THIRTY YEARS OF UNMANNED
SPACE PROBES, Patrick Stephens Limited, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire,
England, 1988. ISBN 0-85059-915-6.
Wilson, Andrew, SOLAR SYSTEM LOG, Jane's Publishing, Inc., New York,
1987. ISBN 0-7106-0444-0.
|
| 550.4 | More planetary probe references | CLIPR::KLAES | N = R*fgfpneflfifaL | Tue Aug 01 1989 16:15 | 92 |
| Here is a more detailed list of books on planetary exploration
by space probes. I recommend the following works, categorized in
three groups: General overviews, specific books on particular space
missions, and periodical sources on space probes. This list is by no
means complete; it is primarily designed to give you places to start
your research through generally available works on the subject. If
anyone can add pertinent works to the list, it would be greatly
appreciated.
Though naturally I recommend all the books listed below, I think
it would be best to start out with the general overview books, in order
to give a clearer idea of the history of space exploration in this area.
I also recommend picking up some good, up-to-date general works on
astronomy and the Sol system, to give you some extra background. Most
of these books and periodicals can be found in any good public and
university library. Some of the more recently published works can also
be purchased in and/or ordered through any good mass-market bookstore.
General Overviews (in alphabetical order by author):
Merton E. Davies and Bruce C. Murray, THE VIEW FROM SPACE:
PHOTOGRAPHIC EXPLORATION OF THE PLANETS, 1971
Kenneth Gatland et al, THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SPACE TECHNOLOGY,
1981
Kenneth Gatland, ROBOT EXPLORERS, 1972
Clayton R. Koppes, JPL AND THE AMERICAN SPACE PROGRAM: A
HISTORY OF THE JET PROPULSION LABORATORY, 1982
Carl Sagan, PLANETS, 1969 (LIFE Science Library)
Arthur Smith, PLANETARY EXPLORATION: THIRTY YEARS OF UNMANNED
SPACE PROBES, 1988
Andrew Wilson, (JANE'S) SOLAR SYSTEM LOG, 1987
Specific Mission References:
Charles A. Cross and Patrick Moore, THE ATLAS OF MERCURY, 1977
(The MARINER 10 mission to Venus and Mercury, 1973-1975)
Joel Davis, FLYBY: THE INTERPLANETARY ODYSSEY OF VOYAGER 2, 1987
Irl Newlan, FIRST TO VENUS: THE STORY OF MARINER 2, 1963
Margaret Poynter and Arthur L. Lane, VOYAGER: THE STORY OF A
SPACE MISSION, 1984
Carl Sagan, MURMURS OF EARTH, 1978 (Deals with the Earth
information records placed on VOYAGER 1 and 2 in case the
probes are found by intelligences in interstellar space,
as well as the probes and planetary mission objectives
themselves.)
Other works and periodicals:
NASA has published very detailed and technical books on every
space probe mission it has launched. Good university libraries will
carry these books, and they are easily found simply by knowing which
mission you wish to read about. I recommend these works after you
first study some of the books listed above.
Some periodicals I recommend for reading on space probes are
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, which has written articles on the PIONEER probes
to Earth's Moon Luna and the Jovian planets Jupiter and Saturn, the
RANGER, SURVEYOR, LUNAR ORBITER, and APOLLO missions to Luna, the
MARINER missions to Mercury, Venus, and Mars, the VIKING probes to
Mars, and the VOYAGER missions to Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus (and
soon Neptune).
More details on American, Soviet, European, and Japanese probe
missions can be found in SKY AND TELESCOPE, ASTRONOMY, and SCIENTIFIC
AMERICAN magazines. TIME, NEWSWEEK, and various major newspapers can
supply not only general information on certain missions, but also show
you what else was going on with Earth at the time events were unfolding,
if that is of interest to you. Space missions are affected by numerous
political and economic factors.
Depending on just how far your interest in space probes will
go, you might also wish to join The Planetary Society, one of the
largest space groups in the world dedicated to planetary exploration.
Their periodical, THE PLANETARY REPORT, details the latest space
probe missions. Membership in the Society is $20 yearly for U.S.
citizens. Write to The Planetary Society, 65 North Catalina Avenue,
Pasadena, California 91106 USA.
Larry
|
| 550.5 | | STAR::HUGHES | | Wed Aug 02 1989 12:32 | 10 |
| Regarding corrections:
1) missing from the list in .0 are the criteria for inclusion, one of which was
that the probe had to have maintained contact for some minimum distance from
Earth and presumably have reached that distance.
2) since corrections and comments were requested, you may wish to send the
additions (if you haven't already) to the author or to Peter Yee.
gary
|
| 550.6 | The Nedelin Catastrophe | VOSTOK::LEPAGE | Truth travels slowly | Mon Aug 14 1989 10:02 | 28 |
| Re:.3
According to the article "Area-10" by Aleksandr Bolotin in the
April 15-22, 1989 issue of "Ogonyok", the Nedelin Catastrophe of
October 24, 1960 did NOT involve the attempted launch of a Mars probe.
Instead it involved the launch of an R-16 ICBM (better known in the West
as the SS-7 "Saddler") which was designed and built by the Yangel
Bureau. The R-16 was developed (rather hastily) as a militarily
practical replacement for the R-7 ICBM (aka SS-6 "Sapwood" which served
as the first two stages of the "A" class space launcher family
including the Soyuz launcher) which was designed and built by the Korolev
Bureau. The R-16 used storable propellants and could stand by for
launch on a moment's notice. The R-7 used liquid oxygen as its oxidizer
and required several hours to be prepared for launch making it only a
marginally useful ICBM. All the other details of the disaster related
in .3 are correct including the death of Nedelin and a "substantial
number" of specialists including Nosov, Ostashev, and probably the bulk
of the best engineers of the Yangel Bureau.
The R-16 was a two stage ICBM similar in size and capability as the
American Titan II. It was deployed in three different versions starting
in the early 1960's and was capable of delivering a 20-25 MEGATON
warhead. It used kerosene and red fuming nitric acid as propellants,
had a length of about 32 meters, an estimated diameter of 2.8 meteres,
and a weight of about 102 metric tons. Its range is estimated as being
11,000 km. The last R-16 is thought to have been taken out of service
in the early 1980's.
Drew
|
| 550.7 | | STAR::HUGHES | | Mon Aug 14 1989 10:22 | 18 |
| re .6
That more or less agrees with the translation contained in
'Spaceflight', although your data on the SS-7 is at odds with my
references (Spaceflight did not discuss the SS-7/R-16).
It is unlikely to be an equivalent to the Titan II, given its initial
service date of 1962 and what is known about Soviet rocket engine
development. Most sources credit it with a throw weight of around 5MT.
Kerosene/IRFNA is an unusual combination for the Soviets too. Where did
you get the data from (we can continue this offline if you prefer, its
not really relevant to SPACE)?
BTW, the major drawback of the SS-6 was that it very inaccurate, unlike
its US contemporary the Atlas. Both suffered from long response times
due to LOX loading requirements.
gary
|
| 550.8 | More on the R-16/SS-7 | VOSTOK::LEPAGE | Truth travels slowly | Tue Aug 15 1989 11:29 | 70 |
|
Re: .7
There were some questions regarding my statements about the R-16/SS-7
"Saddler" in reply 550.6.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
It is unlikely to be an equivalent to the Titan II, given its initial
service date of 1962 and what is known about Soviet rocket engine
development.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
I did not say that. I said that the R-16 was "similar in size and capability
as the American Titan II". I did not say nor did I mean to imply that the
R-16 was a copy of the Titan II or that they had IDENTICAL capabilities and
engine technology.
R-16 Titan II
Length ~32 m 31.4 m
Diameter ~2.8 m 3.05 m
Weight ~102 metric tons 149.7 metric tons
Range ~11,000 Km 15,000 Km
Warhead yeild 5-25 MT 5-10 MT
Introduced 1961 1963
As I said, "similar in size and capability".
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Most sources credit it with a throw weight of around 5MT.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
It is true that the typical R-16/SS-7 "Saddler" warhead yeild was 5 MT.
It is also true that versions with more powerful warheads were probably
tested and possibly deployed with yeilds as great as 20-25 MT, hence my
statement that the R-16 was "capable of delivering a 20-25 MT warhead".
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Kerosene/IRFNA is an unusual combination for the Soviets too. Where did
you get the data from ?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Kerosene and RFNA is not that unusual a propellant combination for the
Soviets. It was definitely used by the RD-214 engines used in the SS-4
"Sandal" MRBM and the B class Cosmos satellite launcher (SL-7). This
combination was possibly used in the SS-8 "Sasin" ICBM. It is possible,
however, that the R-16 used UDMH as a fuel instead of kerosene. Nobody
in the West knows for sure. And this is an important point; all the information
available on the R-16/SS-7 "Saddler" in the West are just estimates and
best geusses. The Soviets released very few photos and even less technical
information about this ICBM so there are bound to be slight variations in
the printed specs from one source to another.
As far as what source I used, initially I used "The Illustrated Encyclopedia
of Rockets & Missles" (1979) by Bill Gunston. After your reply I double
checked my information in "The Rocket" (1978) by David Baker. This book
did not mention what the propellants were (it just said "storable liquid
propellant"), no weight estimate was quoted, and the range is given as
10,500 Km but the dimensions agree to within a fraction of a meter.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
BTW, the major drawback of the SS-6 was that it very inaccurate, unlike
its US contemporary the Atlas. Both suffered from long response times
due to LOX loading requirements.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
I agree completely. I forgot to mention the acuracy issue which, in military
terms, is as important as response time.
Drew
|
| 550.9 | Future U.S. planetary probes | RENOIR::KLAES | N = R*fgfpneflfifaL | Tue Aug 29 1989 11:34 | 93 |
| The following is a list of future United States planetary probes
through the start of the next century:
Magellan - Launched May 4 from the Shuttle Atlantis, this spacecraft
will map at least 90 percent of the surface of Venus starting in 1990.
Galileo - Scheduled for launch October 12, 1989, from Atlantis.
Galileo will spend at least 20 months in orbit around Jupiter and drop
a probe into its atmosphere in 1995.
Cassini - NASA currently is trying to secure funding to build this
probe to orbit Saturn and drop a probe into the atmosphere of its
largest moon, Titan.
Comet Rendezvous And Flyby (CRAF) - Built with Cassini-type
hardware, CRAF would rendezvous with a comet and fire a penetrator
into its crust.
Ulysses - A joint project between NASA and the European Space
Agency, Ulysses will be launched in 1990 from a Shuttle into an orbit
around the poles of the Sun. To get there, it must first fly to Jupiter,
where it will utilize the giant planet's gravity to whip it up out of
the plane of the planets (the ecliptic) and back toward the Sun.
Mars Observer - An economy-class Mars orbiter scheduled for launch
in 1992.
Here is a list of milestones involving upcoming U.S. interplanetary
missions as currently planned by NASA (in some cases, exact dates have
not yet been determined):
05/04/1989 -- Magellan is launched to Venus from the Shuttle Atlantis.
05/21/1989 -- Magellan's trajectory is fine tuned with a short
rocket firing.
06/05/1989 -- Voyager 2 starts long-range observations of Neptune.
08/06/1989 -- Voyager 2 starts Neptune far-encounter phase.
08/24/1989 -- Voyager 2 flies past Neptune at an altitude of 3,000
miles.
08/29/1989 -- Voyager 2 starts the Neptune post-encounter phase.
10/02/1989 -- Voyager 2 ends the Neptune encounter.
10/12/1989 -- Galileo is launched from the Shuttle Atlantis
12/21/1989 -- Magellan's trajectory is fine-tuned with a short
rocket firing.
02/09/1990 -- Galileo flies past Venus at an altitude of 9,300 miles
08/10/1990 -- Magellan slips into orbit around Venus.
08/28/1990 -- Magellan begins mapping the surface of Venus.
10/10/1990 -- Ulysses is launched from the Shuttle Atlantis.
12/08/1990 -- Galileo flies past Earth at an altitude of 620 miles.
04/28/1991 -- Magellan ends its initial 243-day mapping mission.
10/29/1991 -- Galileo flies past an asteroid named Gaspra.
12/??/1991 -- Ulysses uses a Jupiter fly-by to send it back toward
the Sun.
09/??/1992 -- Mars Observer is launched by a Titan 3 rocket.
12/08/1992 -- Galileo flies past Earth at an altitude of 186 miles.
08/??/1993 -- Mars Observer goes into orbit around Mars.
08/28/1993 -- Galileo flies past Asteroid Ida on the way to Jupiter.
04/??/1994 -- Ulysses flies over the south pole of the Sun.
11/??/1994 -- Ulysses crosses solar equator.
07/??/1995 -- Galileo releases an atmospheric probe.
08/??/1995 -- Ulysses flies over the north pole of the sun to
conclude its mission.
08/22/1995 -- CRAF is launched by a Titan 4 rocket on a trajectory
toward its cometary target.
12/07/1995 -- Galileo orbits Jupiter; probe enters atmosphere.
04/08/1996 -- Cassini is launched by a Titan 4 rocket.
03/14/1997 -- Cassini flies past Asteroid 66 Maja.
07/06/1997 -- CRAF flies past Earth.
01/22/1998 -- CRAF flies past Asteroid 449 Hamburga.
06/13/1998 -- Cassini makes a second Earth fly-by.
02/01/2000 -- Cassini uses Jupiter's gravity to bend course toward
Saturn.
08/14/2000 -- CRAF reaches Comet Kopff.
07/20/2001 -- CRAF fires a small penetrator into the comet's crust.
10/02/2002 -- Cassini goes into orbit around Saturn.
12/12/2002 -- CRAF and Comet Kopff make close approach to the Sun.
01/11/2003 -- Cassini drops a probe into the atmosphere of Titan.
03/31/2003 -- CRAF mission ends.
12/31/2006 -- Cassini mission ends.
|
| 550.10 | The return of Galileo? | TKOV02::BIBER | | Tue Aug 29 1989 22:43 | 13 |
| Pardon my ignorance of planetary mechanics, but could someone explain
all these Galileo mission flybys of Earth? One at 600 odd miles,
the other at 186 miles. I assume this is part of some slingshot
windup mechanism but I've not heard of an interplanetary probe
revisiting the Earth before. Is this a first?
Will we get Earth images from the same scanning platforms that will
be used at the other planets? I did think, during the Neptune/Triton
encounter, that it would have been interesting to have a side by
side comparison of the returning images (resolution, colour etc)
of the planet and, say something we are familiar with, ie the Earth
or its moon.
Anyone ever see this done?
Thanks.
|
| 550.11 | | PAXVAX::MAIEWSKI | | Tue Aug 29 1989 23:02 | 14 |
| Galileo has to use Venus and the Earth to boost it's orbit to Jupiter because
the Shuttle - IUS is not powerfull enough to launch it directly. I believe that
Galileo was originally suppose to use the General Dynamics Hy powered Centuar
"wide can", a wide version of the Centuar designed for the Shuttle. The Centuar
was canceled by NASA after the Challanger accident for safty reasons because
there was no way to dump the Hydrogen fuel if an emergency landing had to be
made.
George
PS, Too bad there's nothing planed for Pluto. A Voyager 3 mission to
Jupiter then to Pluto sure would be nice. Anyone know if the Space
Telescope is scheduled to take pictures of Pluto any time early
in it's mission?
|
| 550.12 | Is state of the art goodness for interplanetary craft? | EPIK::BUEHLER | On cruise control | Tue Aug 29 1989 23:13 | 11 |
| Has the technology for planetary probes been evolving much? For
example, what sorts of computer hardware went onto Voyager 2 versus
Galileo or Magellan versus what would be used for Cassini and other
follow-ons?
I'd ask similar questions about the optics, communication equipment and
other hardware that these craft carry. I may not be able to make heads
or tails from any answers, but I'm sure it would make for interesting
reading.
John
|
| 550.13 | Photos of Earh-Moon System | LHOTSE::DAHL | Tom Dahl, CDMS | Wed Aug 30 1989 10:11 | 15 |
| RE: <<< Note 550.10 by TKOV02::BIBER >>>
> I did think, during the Neptune/Triton
> encounter, that it would have been interesting to have a side by
> side comparison of the returning images (resolution, colour etc)
> of the planet and, say something we are familiar with, ie the Earth
> or its moon.
> Anyone ever see this done?
One of the Voyagers took at least one photograph of the Earth-Moon system
from a million or so miles out from Earth. In a low-key sort of way I found
it an impressive picture; seeing both worlds to scale from a distance. Puts
things in perspective much more than the lunar orbit pictures with the Earth
in the background rising over the moon.
-- Tom
|
| 550.14 | Earth Flyby, Voyager 3, & Galileo | VOSTOK::LEPAGE | Truth travels slowly | Wed Aug 30 1989 10:49 | 36 |
| Re: .10
As a previous reply mentioned, Galileo will make a flyby of Venus
and two passes by Earth to pump up its orbit up so that it can reach
Jupiter. This is the first time that this sort of maneuver has been
used but it will not be the last. Cassini (a proposed orbiter to Saturn
and Titan), for example, will require a single flyby of Earth after its
launch on a Titan IV/Centaur G to reach Jupiter which will be used in
turn to reach Saturn. This is a perfect example of how advanced our
computer technology has become (being able to identify these flyby
opportunities) while at the same time how our launch capability has
stagnated (by not being able to easily launch more advanced payloads).
Re: .11
Concerning your off hand remark about about a "Voyager 3" to
Jupiter and Pluto, it just so happens that there is a highly favorable
launch window available in the fall of 1990 for a flyby of Jupiter that
will sling shot the spacecraft to Pluto. A Voyager-like spacecraft
using a Titan IIIE/Centaur could make it to Pluto by about 1997 or
1998. The next launch opportunity (which won't be as favorable) won't
open until about 2003.
Re: .12
The technology used in Galileo is far more advanced than that used
in the Voyagers. The builders have borrowed from military technology
and are using radiation hardened electronics so that the probe will not
be as vulnerable to radiation as Voyager. The cameras on Galileo will
use CCDs instead of vidicon tubes which are MUCH more sensitive
(especially in the red) and have a linear response and large dynamic
range. Instead of the central sequencer that Voyager has, each
subsystem in Galileo has its own microprocessor thus making Galileo
even more flexible than Voyager.
These are just a few of the many improvements made since the
Voyager flights.
Drew
|
| 550.15 | Pluto?, Solar system scale pictures? | VIRRUS::DIEWALD | I'm gonna finish this scenario, even if it kills me... | Wed Aug 30 1989 12:08 | 19 |
| re: .11, .14 and Pluto probe:
One of the last CNN Voyager updates contained a cryptic remark about the
possibility of a Pluto probe being added to the list of NASA plans for
planetary probes. This seems highly unlikely given the current budget
constraints - even though it would be interesting. I believe that during
the "Neptune All Night" broadcast, one of the NASA scientists said that the
Thousand Astronomical Unit (TAU) project could involve a Pluto-Charon flyby,
which may be what the CNN report was referring to.
re: .13 and Earth-Moon pictures.
There was a report (Boston Globe?) that Carl Sagan has suggested that
Voyager turn its cameras back toward the inner solar system and use the
radio dish as a sun shield. That way, Voyager could take a picture looking
back at the far distant Earth, as a bright blue object. The report claimed
that it would take a small "additional appropriation", which I didn't
understand. The whole idea is to present an image showing the true scale of
the solar system.
|
| 550.16 | A Small Appropriation | VOSTOK::LEPAGE | Truth travels slowly | Wed Aug 30 1989 12:39 | 16 |
| Re:.15
The "small additional appropriation" that Carl Sagan refered to is
money. Such a picture would be taken sometime early next year after the
present Neptune encounter. This picture would require several man-hours
of planing, a few man-hours to work out the command sequence, extra
time on the Deep Space Network to send the commands and receive the
picture, and of course a couple of man-hours plus computer time to
process the image. Depending on how they spread out the costs and the
amount of accounting magic JPL does, this one image would cost a couple
of tens of thousands of dollars. That may not sound like much but the
simple fact of the matter is that the money is not in the budget. If
JPL and NASA management are convinced that it is worth it, the money
can be found otherwise, no money = no picture.
Drew
|
| 550.17 | Triton-Neptune Photo from Voyager 2 | LHOTSE::DAHL | Tom Dahl, CDMS | Thu Aug 31 1989 10:30 | 4 |
| There is a nice picture on page 1 of today's Boston Globe which has a crescent
Triton in the foreground, and a much smaller crescent Neptune in the
background. Very pretty.
-- Tom
|
| 550.18 | "You know you're close to home when you can see the lights." | REVEAL::LEE | Wook... Like 'Book' with a 'W' | Tue Sep 12 1989 18:03 | 5 |
| The neat thing about getting a picture of the whole Solar System would be that
it would provide an idea of what future space travelers will learn to recognize
as "home". At least, I'd like to think so.
Wook
|
| 550.19 | Exploring the solar system together | RENOIR::KLAES | N = R*fgfpneflfifaL | Mon Nov 20 1989 18:10 | 36 |
| Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: U.S./USSR Solar System Joint Working Group met in Moscow (Forwarded)
Date: 20 Nov 89 22:10:54 GMT
Reply-To: [email protected] (Peter E. Yee)
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Debra J. Rahn
Headquarters, Washington, D.C. November 20, 1989
RELEASE: 89-178
U.S./USSR SOLAR SYSTEM JOINT WORKING GROUP MET IN MOSCOW
The third meeting of the U.S./USSR Joint Working Group (JWG) on
Solar System Exploration was held Nov. 13-18, 1989, in Moscow. The
Soviet delegation was headed by the Director of the Vernadsky
Geochemical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Academician
V.L. Barsukov. The U.S. delegation was headed by Samuel W. Keller,
NASA Associate Deputy Administrator.
During the meeting, specialists of both sides noted that at the
present time the continued exploration of the planet Mars is of
primary interest. To increase the scientific return of these and
other planetary missions, they agreed to coordinate scientific
programs and studies planned in the Soviet Union and the United
States. They also agreed on the participation of Soviet and U.S.
scientists as co-investigators in each other's projects and on the
exchange of scientific data from these missions.
The participants at the meeting held a preliminary discussion of
studies required to establish scientific goals for lunar science.
The next meeting of the JWG is scheduled for fall l990 in
Washington, D.C. The JWG was established under the U.S./USSR Space
Science Cooperation Agency signed in April l987.
|
| 550.20 | CRAF and CASSINI updates | RENOIR::KLAES | N = R*fgfpneflfifaL | Mon Dec 04 1989 11:48 | 38 |
| From: [email protected] (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Space news from October 9 AW&ST, part 2
Date: 4 Dec 89 00:13:27 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
[The following is the rest of the extensive planetary-missions
coverage in the Oct 9 issue, hitting the high spots only.]
CRAF's penetrator propulsion system has changed from a solid
rocket to a liquid rocket to permit postponing choice of the impact
velocity until after a first look at the comet. The penetrator design
people would really prefer to know now whether they have to deal with
fluffy snow or solid ice, but the current design should get at least
30cm into something as hard as sea ice, enough to get the gamma-ray
spectrometer into the surface at least. The CRAF main bus is designed
to be capable of carrying two penetrators, although the current budget
is for one; everyone would prefer to send two, partly as a hedge
against trouble and partly so a successful first impact in a "safe"
area could be followed by a shot at a more interesting area.
Cassini is planned for launch in April 1996 on a Titan/Centaur.
It will use an Earth gravity assist, with encounter 26 months after
launch. An encounter with asteroid Maja will occur between launch and
Earth encounter, and the possibility of a second asteroid encounter is
being studied. Cassini then proceeds to Jupiter, for a gravity assist
there in Feb 2000. Saturn arrival would be early in 2002.
Cassini's Titan probe would probably take 2-3 hours to descend on
its parachute, and there is hope of both data on surface hardness
(from the probe's accelerometers) and pictures from the surface (if
the probe survives impact). The Cassini orbiter will also do
Magellan's trick of using its main communications antenna for radar
mapping of Titan's surface.
Mars can wait: we've barely | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
started exploring the Moon. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [email protected]
|
| 550.21 | Lunar rovers and sample returns | 15372::LEPAGE | Serving the servants of man | Tue Jun 05 1990 12:54 | 23 |
| Re:459.53
Mike,
The Soviets never flew a combination rover/sample return mission.
They did fly three successful sample return missions (Luna 16, 20, and
24) and two successful lunar rovers (Lunokhod 1 and 2 carried to the
lunar surface by Luna 17 and 21 respectively) during the early to mid
1970s. The Soviets never seemed inclined to combine these missions at
that time. (If the question is "where are they now?", the rovers, their
carrier platforms, and the decent stages of the sample return missions
are at various locations on the Moon. The successful sample return
mission Earth return stages burned up in the Earth's atmosphere, and
the reentry modules are on display in various museums.)
Present Soviet plans for Mars also seem to have seperate rover and
sample return missions. The Soviet Mars rover is planned for launch
possibly in 1996 or, more likely, 1998 and a sample return is planned
around the 2000 to 2004 time frame. Neither of these missions have been
approved as of yet so they could still be combined, or postponed or
even cancelled indefinitely. We or for that matter the Soviet scientist
won't know for sure for probably another few years.
Drew
|
| 550.22 | Luna 92 | 4024::BIRO | | Tue Jun 05 1990 15:36 | 18 |
| According to Nick Johnson in 'Soviet Year in Space 1989'
The Soviet lunar exploratin program is now set to resume in 1992. the
object of Luna 92 is to ut a psacecraft into a 85 deg inclined orbit
about the Moon. It will be based on the Phobos spacecraft design.
Its Goals inlude:
video atlases of the moon
morphological and gelogical maps
maps of chemical composition and radioactivity
maps of magnetic, thermo and gravitational fields.
These maps will be used to select a landing site for future
unmanned /manned spacecraft for the 1996 mission that will
retrun a soil sample of the Moons's farside. This could be
a joint US USSR endevor employing an American orbiter and a Soviet
lander/return vehicle... Time will tell
jb
|
| 550.23 | The first Mars rovers - on MARS 2 and 3 | ADVAX::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Tue Oct 02 1990 13:55 | 30 |
| From: [email protected] (Daniel Fischer)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Soviet space incidents: fantasy & fact
Date: 1 Oct 90 16:55:13 GMT
Organization: Max-Planck-Institut fuer Radioastronomie, Bonn
In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (John A. Weeks III) writes:
>In <[email protected]> [email protected] (Daniel Fischer) writes:
>> Recall that the crash-landing of two soviet (unmanned) rovers on Mars wasn't
>> acknowledged until a few months ago - why (in principle) shouldn't it be
>Do you have any references for this, or can you provide more details. I
>listen to the net & CNN quite closely, but I do not recall hearing this.
It was reported in the July/August 1990 issue of THE PLANETARY
REPORT, the journal of The Planetary Society....this journal is *great*.
On page 7, it gave a detailed account of the SOVIET MARS 2 and MARS 3
rovers that were to move on a tether (15 meters long) but with some
Artificial Intelligence (with Soviet computers in 1971!) and to make
crude tests of what the Martian surface is like. A detailed photograph
of one of the rovers was also provided!
BTW: The French newsletter CHRONIQUE MARTIENNE recently unveiled
Soviet plans in the 1970s to fly a Mars Sample Return Mission (which
had almost approached hardware development before it was eliminated -
when it was finally realized that SovTech simply couldn't do it) - the
MARS 2/3 experiments, IMHO, were meant to prepare just that.
--- [email protected] = Daniel Fischer ---
|
| 550.24 | contavct details | 60608::MANSFIELD | | Thu Oct 04 1990 23:04 | 8 |
| This may of been requested before but,
can someone post details of contacting the Planetery Society and how to
subscribe to their magazine.
ta,
Simon
|
| 550.25 | RE 550.24 | ADVAX::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Fri Oct 05 1990 10:42 | 2 |
| See Topics 133 and 233.
|
| 550.26 | Where all those upper booster stages go | ADVAX::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Tue Oct 09 1990 15:56 | 88 |
| From: [email protected] (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Lifeless interplanetary travellers - where are they now?
Date: 9 Oct 90 16:46:03 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
In article <[email protected]> [email protected]
(Daniel Fischer) writes:
>Who can tell what has become of all those Upper Stages that were used in the
>past 1.5 years to launch Magellan, Galileo and Ulysses? They were separated
>from the spaceprobes after those had reached their escape velocity, so they
>should be on similar orbits - what steps have been taken to increase their
>distance from the S/C so that accidental collisions or electrical interference
>are excluded? ...
Generally, arrangements are made to give the payload a small
velocity difference from the final stage. This can be anything from
just springs in the separation mechanism up to a separation burn by a
sophisticated rocket stage. The IUS is relatively smart and, as I
recall, does a separation burn with the last of its attitude-control
fuel. Relatively dumb stages, like the final boost motor for Ulysses,
just use spring or pyrotechnic separation and hope for the best. :-)
Actually, even a little bit of separation velocity generally does
the job quite adequately, provided that subsequent velocity changes
don't act to bring the objects together again. The most notorious
case of this was the amateur-radio satellite (Oscar 10?) that got
rear-ended by the Ariane third stage that had just deployed it -- the
stage was dumping propellants before shutting down, and the dumping
gave it enough forward delta-V to catch up with the satellite.
Space is so big and even small perturbations add up sufficiently
over time that the risk of collision long after separation is slight.
The stuff ends up in semi-random orbits and blends into all the
natural space junk out there.
>... what has happend to the Galileo-IUS which should have
>been on a rather similar trajectory? Will it also come close to earth again?
I would be surprised. Gravity-assist maneuvers require hitting a
fairly narrow window at the assist planet. Galileo's IUS probably
ended up somewhere nearly random after Venus encounter. Ditto for
Magellan's.
>paper in the ESA BULLETIN #63 speaks of 11.4km/s relative to earth, while
>several U.S. media repeatedly talked of 15.2km/s - any explanations welcome].
This might be velocity at infinity vs. velocity at motor burnout.
>And finally: where will Phobos-1 end up? It couldn't orbit-insert at Mars, so
>will it return to earth on its Hohmann-style trajectory? When? ...
My guess would be that it came close enough to Mars to have its
perihelion changed. Failing that, it would return to Earth's orbit,
but the odds are roughly zero that Earth would be nearby at the time
-- Earth's orbit is half a billion kilometers long.
>... Phobos-2 as well as the
>Viking-Orbiters should be in stable Martian orbits ...
Well, stable except for air drag, which is noticeable even for
Mars's thin atmosphere. As I recall, Mariner 9 is scheduled to go
down circa 1997, and the Viking orbiters will follow early in the 21st
century. There was originally hope that serious exploration of the
Martian surface would be underway before these unsterilized spacecraft
crashed, but....
>...whether somebody takes care of the whereabouts of the interplanetary
>space debris. The pollution of earth's LEO and GEO is well-known by now, and
>steps to protection are being taken (er, planned (er, talked about)) - but
>who protects interplanetary space?
At present, protection really is not needed. Tons of human junk
are lost in the gigatons of natural junk already present. Near-Earth
space has a debris problem because it is small and there is intense
activity there. Ignoring the narrow belt around Clarke orbit for the
moment, near-Earth space essentially ends 1000km up, where the inner
Van Allen belt starts to really make itself felt. That's about 500
billion [North American billion, 10^9] cubic km. Even just cislunar
space -- within the average radius of the Moon's orbit -- is *268
million* billion cubic km, half a million times larger. The space
between Venus's orbit and Mars's orbit within, say, five million km of
the ecliptic, is very roughly one million billion billion cubic km.
Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
[email protected] utzoo!henry
|
| 550.27 | Thirty years ago today... | ADVAX::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Wed Oct 10 1990 09:50 | 26 |
| Though this probe failed to achieve even an Earth parking orbit,
today, October 10, marks the thirtieth anniversary of humanity's first
attempt to reach another planet, namely Mars.
On October 10, 1960, the Soviet Union launched the first of two
unmanned space probes designed to flyby and examine the planet Mars.
Unfortunately, the MOLNIYA rocket booster which was delivering it
towards interplanetary space suffered a malfunction in its upper
stages, causing the probe to plunge back to its destruction on the
ground. Another attempt with a similar craft four days later fol-
lowed a similar fate high above the Tyuratam Space Center in the
Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan.
In a policy which the Soviets have only recently begun to ease
up on, nothing was mentioned of these space mission failures to the
rest of the world. Even today, the human race's first attempts to
explore Mars are known in the West simply as MARS 1960A and 1960B.
Fortunately our space vessels have become much more sophisticated
and successful since 1960, greatly improving our knowledge of Mars and
almost every other world in the solar system. In another thirty years,
we will hopefully be celebrating the first human expedition to the
surface of the Red Planet.
Larry
|
| 550.28 | Studying comets and planetoids via infrared | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Mon Sep 16 1991 14:12 | 69 |
| Article 16858
From: [email protected] (Nick Szabo)
Newsgroups: sci.astro,sci.space
Subject: Comet missions (was Re: Mass of a comet)
Date: 14 Sep 91 23:42:06 GMT
Organization: TECHbooks of Beaverton Oregon - Public Access Unix
In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Anita Cochran) writes:
>... About 3 dozen comets are known to have split (at least a chunk).
>Of these, only a few were close to Jupiter or another planet any time
>near the break-up time.... A piece of Encke is probably the source of the
>matter for the Tunguska event.
>...Just remember, science is not
>simple, especially when studying fickle bodies like comets. This is why
>we really need CRAF and then eventually Rosetta.
Note that CRAF is a comet sampling mission and Rosetta a proposed
comet sample _return_ mission. Both would also fly by one or more
asteroids. These would indeed be quite valuable missions.
Another mission that is needed, and would cost much less than CRAF or
Rosetta, is a follow-on to IRAS dedicated to comets and asteroids.
IRAS was an infrared telescope, the main mission of which was to map
the entire sky with an emphasis on stellar sources. Several thousand
new asteroids and comets exist in the data. Unfortuneately, due to
the stellar nature of the mission these cannot be tracked or
cataloged, since typically there is only one photo per object (to be
trackable there must at lest two or three).
Nevertheless, when the stellar astronomers got through comet explorers
found a treasure trove in the IRAS data. Surprisingly bright (in the
IR) and narrow dust bands in the orbits of P/Tempel 2 and P/Encke are
dramatically visible in the full-sky montage. (For example, see
photos in _The Planetary System_, Morrison & Owen 1987, pg. 114 and
_Asteroids II_, Binzel et. al., pg. 339). These are narrow bands of
large (>2 mm) newly produced particles which eventually evolve into
the much larger toruses that produce meteor showers.
As mentioned, we know that large pieces of "dirty ice" are known to
calve off of comets, often for mysterious reasons. The rate at which
these pieces evaporate is unknown, since they might form a dark crust
(like 2/3 of Halley's surface) or a bright dusty surface that
preserves ice below for one or more orbits. Thus, how long these
smaller pieces stay in existence, and how many currently exist, in an
orbit similar to the parent comet, is unknown. As mentioned, the
Tungaska event, a large fireball in 1908, is believed to have been
caused by such an object, massing about 100,000 tons, calved off of
P/Encke.
A comet/asteroid infrared telescope (CAIT?), lauched on a Delta
rocket, would cost in the range of $40 million (for the launch) and
$40-$80 million (for the telescope). It would discover and track
thousands of new asteroids and comets. It would characterize dust
trails for additional comets. If launched while the Earth is close to
such a dust trail, it might be able to better determine the size
distribution of particles in that band (including larger pieces calved
off from the parent comet).
As a variant, CRAF and/or Rosetta could be equipped with a small
infrared telescope. As we approach the comet, the telescope would
would characterize the dust trail, see how it evolves into the meteor
shower torus, and look for larger pieces calved off from the comet.
--
[email protected] ...!{tektronix!nosun,uunet}techbook!szabo
Public Access UNIX at (503) 644-8135 (1200/2400) Voice: +1 503 646-8257
Public Access User --- Not affiliated with TECHbooks
|
| 550.29 | Before space probes, there was radar | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Mon Sep 30 1991 18:08 | 137 |
| Article 17234
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro
Subject: Planetary Radar Symposium
Date: 30 Sep 91 20:40:44 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Usenet)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
Contact: Franklin O'Donnell
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE September 30, 1991
Thirty years ago last spring, researchers slewed the metal
skeleton of a giant dish antenna toward a spot in the sky and beamed a
pulse of radar energy across tens of millions of miles of space.
Some five minutes later, a faint echo of that signal was received
by a second antenna, several miles to the north in California's Mojave
Desert. The experiment had captured the first radar echo bounced off
another planet, Venus.
In 1991, researchers are using a similar technique to bounce
signals off of Saturn's moon Titan, hundreds of millions of miles
distant in the outer solar system. By snagging an elusive echo from
the surface of Titan -- shrouded by a dense atmosphere boasting
organic chemicals possibly like those that led to life on the Earth --
they may be able to tell if Titan is partially covered by oceans of
ethane, as many scientists believe.
Those experiments -- in 1961 and 1991 -- represent the earliest
attempts and most sophisticated recent efforts in the field of
ground-based planetary radar.
A symposium marking the 30th anniversary of the technique is
being held October 2 at the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena, Calif., sponsored by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
"Radar astronomy was the godfather of the planetary space program,"
said Dr. Nicholas Renzetti, manager of JPL's Telecommunications and Data
Acquisition Science Office and organizer of the Pasadena symposium.
Although such radar experiments can provide nowhere near the
detailed data on planets sent back by exploration spacecraft, the
ground-based technique offers one approach for scientists when no
spacecraft is available.
By counting how long the radar signal took to return from Venus
in the 1961 tests at JPL's Deep Space Network at Goldstone, Calif.,
researchers were able to measure precisely the distance between Earth
and Venus. That in turn offered the best-ever estimate of the
astronomical unit, or AU -- the standard unit of astronomical measure
based on the distance between Earth and the Sun.
Researchers also found that Venus -- cloaked by perpetual clouds
-- rotates in a retrograde direction about once every eight months.
That fact was confirmed the following year when NASA's Mariner 2 made
the first flyby of Venus in August 1962.
In later years, researchers at other institutions used various
other dish antennas around the world to conduct radar studies, among
them Lincoln Laboratory in Massachusetts, Jodrell Bank at Manchester
in the United Kingdom, and various sites in the Soviet Union.
The largest such dish on Earth -- the Arecibo Observatory in
Puerto Rico -- was used by scientists to map the terrain of Mercury,
Venus and Mars.
Planets have not been the only targets for radar studies. Using
the giant Arecibo dish, researchers have bounced radar off of
asteroids to help determine their orbits -- and, in some cases, even
their spin rates. Radar was also used to show for the first time that
comets have a solid nucleus.
Today the most sensitive radar studies are made not with a single
dish antenna but with a network of such antennas arrayed together. In
many current experiments, scientists beam a radar signal into space
from NASA's Goldstone site in the California desert and receive the
bounce hundreds of miles away at the National Radio Astronomy
Observatory's Very Large Array in Socorro, New Mexico.
That technique is currently being used by researchers in an
attempt to resolve some of the surface features of Saturn's moon
Titan. Masked by an opaque haze and orbiting the Sun a billion miles
from Earth, Titan appears featureless to telescopes on Earth. Even
the instruments of the NASA/JPL Voyager spacecraft provided only
limited information on the moon during their flybys in 1980 and 1981.
Contrasts in "brightness" of radar echoes received in June 1989
suggest that continents or some similar features may exist in the
oceans of ethane that scientists believe may cover the surface of
Titan. Although Titan's environment is not hospitable to human-type
life, its atmosphere appears rich in organic chemicals like those that
led to life on Earth. Scientists are particularly interested in
studying Titan to understand better conditions on the early Earth.
Titan and its parent planet, Saturn, will be the destination of
Cassini, a NASA/JPL mission with the European Space Agency to be
launched in the mid-1990s. Clues from ground-based radar studies may
help to shape the investigations that the Cassini spacecraft will
carry out.
Speakers at the Pasadena symposium will include:
-- Prof. Solomon W. Golomb, University of Southern California,
"The First Touch of Venus";
-- Dr. Donald B. Campbell, Cornell University, "The Exploration
of Venus by Radar";
-- Dr. John K. Harmon, Arecibo Observatory, Puerto Rico, "Radar
Observations of Mars and Mercury";
-- Dr. Steven J. Ostro, JPL/Caltech, "Asteroid Radar Astronomy";
-- Prof. Von R. Eshelman, Center for Radar Astronomy, Stanford
University, "Early Radar Astronomy at Stanford";
-- Prof. Duane O. Muhleman, Caltech, "Goldstone-Very Large Array
Observations of Titan."
JPL's ground-based radar studies are sponsored by NASA's Office
of Space Science and Applications with support from the Office of
Space Operations.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 301-355 Telos | For every rule, there is
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | an exception. There is no
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | exception to this rule.
|
| 550.30 | Twenty Years Ago: MARINER 9 orbits Mars | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Thu Nov 14 1991 11:18 | 42 |
| On November 13, 1971, the United States unmanned Mars probe
MARINER 9 became the first spacecraft to orbit another planet.
Launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida on May 30, 1971, MARINER 9
was part of a two-member mission to orbit the Red Planet about its
equator and poles and image its surface in detail. When MARINER 8 was
lost on May 8 due to an ATLAS-CENTAUR rocket failure, MARINER 9 carried
on alone. The American probe arrived just weeks ahead of two Soviet
orbiter/landers, MARS 2 and 3.
When MARINER 9 first settled into orbit, there was little of Mars'
surface to see, as a global dust storm obscured almost all features on
the planet's face. When the dust finally cleared in January of 1972,
MARINER 9 made discoveries about the Red Planet which drastically
changed humanity's earlier views of Mars.
Through the early 1960s, Mars was thought to be a world not too
removed from Earth, compared to most other places in the Sol system.
Scientists thought Mars was a dry desert world with a thin nitrogen
atmosphere, where life forms from rugged plants down to microorganisms
struggled for existence. When MARINER 4 flew by Mars in 1965, the 22
images it returned showed a world crater-pocked and apparently as dead
as Earth's moon, Luna. Two more flyby missions in 1969 (MARINER 6-7)
did little to change that concept.
Having the advantage of an extended stay at the Red Planet,
MARINER 9 found a world neither like Earth or Luna. Giant volcanoes
and canyons marked the surface, along with many channels which were
once cut through by flowing water ages ago. These new findings helped
revive the possibility of rudimentary life on Mars, further justifying
the VIKING mission which would be sent there to search for such life
in 1976.
Before running out of attitude control fuel in October of 1972,
MARINER 9 took over seven thousand images of Mars and its two small
moons, Phobos and Deimos, allowing the first accurate maps to be
made of those worlds. The spacecraft now silently orbits the Red
Planet, where it will someday either crash into Mars or be retrieved
by astronauts in orbit about the planet.
Larry
|
| 550.31 | Twenty Years Ago: MARS 2-3 Reach the Red Planet | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Tue Dec 03 1991 15:18 | 156 |
| The following is excerpted from "The Rocky Soviet Road to Mars",
by Larry Klaes, published in the August, 1990 issue of SPACEFLIGHT
magazine, a publication of the British Interplanetary Society (BIS):
"The first year of the 1970s bore witness to the closest approach
of the Red Planet in its solar orbit to Earth since 1956. Fifteen
years earlier, neither the Soviets nor the U.S. had lofted even a
single satellite into orbit around Earth; now the two nations were
launching their most ambitious assaults yet on the fourth world from
the Sun.
"The U.S. made the first launch attempt with MARINER 8 on May 9.
It was designed to orbit Mars with MARINER 9 and examine the entire
surface of Mars for at least ninety days. Instead, the spacecraft
ended up in the Atlantic Ocean when an autopilot fault in the CENTAUR
stage of its ATLAS-CENTAUR rocket booster sent the craft wildly off
course.
"The Soviets had equally bad luck the next day. What might have
been officially designated a MARS probe instead became COSMOS 419 when
the vehicle failed to leave its parking orbit around Earth. The probe
was subsequently destroyed upon re-entering the atmosphere on May 12.
Success was finally achieved nine days later when the Soviet MARS 2
spacecraft escaped Earth's gravitational well. It was followed on May
28 by a twin named MARS 3. The U.S. rounded out the Mars launches two
days after MARS 3 with MARINER 9, which also found its way on to the
Red Planet.
"MARS 2 and 3 were more advanced than any Soviet Mars spacecraft
developed before. Weighing 4,650 kilograms (10,250 pounds) each, the
MARS craft carried 450-kilogram (990-pound) landers to photograph and
examine the Martian surface. The lander design was based on that of
the LUNA 9 and 13 Moon landers of 1966: A sphere kept upright by four
metal "petals" which opened around the lander's base after touchdown.
The crafts' main buses contained rocket thrusters designed to brake
the probes for insertion into orbit around Mars, where they would
serve both as scientific stations and orbital relays for the landers'
signals back to Earth. Even the project's design team was of a new
generation, averaging less than thirty years in age. The team was
supervised by veteran mission specialists.
"Although launched from Earth last, MARINER 9 had taken a shorter
flight path and arrived at Mars on November 13. It became the first
spacecraft to orbit another planet. MARS 2 came on the scene November
27, followed by MARS 3 two days into the following month.
"As the space vessels assembled in orbit in preparation for
wresting many of the secrets from this small world, Mars was to
try to hide itself from human scrutiny once last time. During the
months that the Soviet and American probes were traveling towards
the Red Planet, astronomers on Earth noted that a major dust storm
was brewing up on Mars. By the time the spacecraft had arrived in
Martian orbit, the dust storm had engulfed the entire planet,
obscuring almost every surface feature from the view of the probes'
electronic eyes. MARINER 9 waited out the dust storm to begin
its primary tasks. MARS 2 and 3 had no such luxury. Due to design
limitations, the Soviet probes had to release their landers before
injecting themselves into Mars orbit; they could not wait for the
raging dust storm to end.
"After being ejected from the orbiter buses, the landers were to
enter the thin Martian atmosphere at supersonic speeds. The craft
would be protected from heat friction with the air by a surrounding
aeroshield. Once past this critical phase of the descent, a parachute
would be released to slow the craft even further, followed by the
ejection of the shield. Just before touchdown, the MARS landers would
fire retrorockets to cushion the landing impact to a survivable
velocity. On the surface, the landers' metal "petals" would then open
outward to provide balance, and the craft would immediately start to
relay a panoramic view of their surroundings to their orbiting buses
for transmission to Earth. The landers would then carry out various
measurements of the immediate environment until their batteries were
exhausted.
"One mission study which was not conducted by the landers was the
search for life on Mars. Dr. Lev Mukhin, chief of the Laboratory of
Exobiology of the Soviet Institute of Space Research, deemed such
experiments as 'too complex'.
"Whether because of the dust storm or mechanical problems, MARS 2's
surface mission was cut drastically short. The lander was ejected
on November 27 and descended through Mars' turbulent atmosphere as
planned; however, when the moment of touchdown arrived, only silence
was received on Earth. The MARS 2 lander apparently crashed in the
southern hemisphere of Mars in the western end of Hellas Planitia,
a dust-filled basin with few impact craters. Though no data was
returned from the lander, it did become the first human-made vehicle
known to reach the surface of Mars. The lander also deposited a
pennant displaying the Soviet Coat of Arms, which the probe carried
in commemoration of the event. The MARS 2 bus subsequently went into
an orbit ranging in altitude from 1,380 to 25,000 kilometers (860 to
15,500 miles), circling the planet once every eighteen hours.
"Initially, MARS 3 had better luck than its counterpart. Arriving
in orbit on December 2, the lander was released from the main bus
towards Mars and plunged through the wind-swept dust and sand at
supersonic speeds. Three minutes later, the lander successfully
touched down in a heavily cratered plain near the northern rim of an
ancient crater named Ptolemaeus, located in the southern hemisphere.
Ninety seconds after the historic touchdown, the craft's timer
mechanism ordered a panoramic imaging scan of the lander's
surroundings; but just twenty seconds into the scan, the signals
suddenly ceased. A partial picture was returned to Earth, but it
'did not reveal any noticeable difference in the contrast of details',
according to a Soviet report. For almost a full week after the
incident, Soviet controllers tried to regain the lander's signal,
but the effort would eventually prove futile.
"At first the signal loss of the MARS 3 lander was blamed on the
global dust storm as the cause for the probe's demise. The vehicle
may have been saturated with fine sand, or knocked over by strong
winds. Soviet space scientists M. Y. Marov and G. I. Petrov later
announced that the MARS 3 orbiter may have been at fault, failing
to continue transmitting its lander's information to Earth at the
critical time, due to an error in the main bus telemetry system.
"With the MARS lander missions now permanently defunct, Soviet
controllers concentrated on the scientific studies made by the
orbiters. Photographing the planet's surface proved frustrating, as
the dust storm continued to blot out most Martian features through
early 1972. After several weeks the imaging part of the mission was
given secondary status, while MARS 2 and 3 concentrated on taking
measurements of the Martian atmosphere and surface.
"The orbiters discovered atomic hydrogen and oxygen in the upper
atmosphere. The average temperature on the surface ranged from
thirteen degrees Celsius (55.4 degrees Fahrenheit) at noon to -110
degrees Celsius (-230 degrees Fahrenheit) at night. Portions of the
planet's night side were found to be twenty to twenty-five degrees
warmer than some of their immediate surroundings. Atmospheric
pressure on the ground was recorded at 5.5 to 6 millibars (by
comparison, air pressure on Earth averages 1,013 millibars at sea
level), and water vapor was scarce.
"The orbiters were subsequently turned off in August of 1972.
Despite the problems encountered with the landers, MARS 2 and 3 did
become the first Soviet spacecraft to orbit the Red Planet for study
and deposit landers on its surface while still in communication with
Earth."
Notes -
It has since been learned that COSMOS 419 was designed as a
Mars orbiter to reach Mars ahead of the United States MARINER craft
and thus give the Soviet Union credit for being the first nation
to orbit another planet. It was originally thought that COSMOS 419
was a combined orbiter/lander mission like MARS 2 and 3.
It was revealed in the July/August 1990 issue of THE PLANETARY
REPORT (A publication of The Planetary Society) that the MARS 2 and 3
landers carried miniature tethered rovers, which would have conducted
analysis of the Martian soil up to fifteen meters (fifty feet) from
the craft.
Larry
|
| 550.32 | Interesting | FUTURS::HAZEL | Marvin the Paranoid Android was right | Thu Dec 05 1991 07:56 | 11 |
| Re. .31:
Are the author of the note and the author of the article the same
person?
If so, are you a member of the BIS, or just a reader of Spaceflight? I
used to be an FBIS, until I resigned my membership over the level of
their subscription fees in comparison with the price of the magazine.
Dave Hazel
|
| 550.33 | RE 550.32 | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Thu Dec 05 1991 09:24 | 6 |
| Yes to your first question, and yes I am both a member of the BIS
and a reader of SPACEFLIGHT magazine. I also agree that the fees are
a bit steep, but the magazine is worth it, in my opinion.
Larry
|
| 550.34 | Regional Planetary Image Facilities | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Thu Jan 16 1992 12:55 | 180 |
| Article: 19592
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,sci.geo.geology,sci.misc
Subject: Regional Planetary Image Facilities
Date: 16 Jan 92 02:58:27 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Usenet)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
REGIONAL PLANETARY IMAGE FACILITIES
The Planetary Geology and Geophysics Program co-sponsors an
international system of regional planetary image facilities (RPIFs).
These facilities function as a library of planetary image data and
associated information. Each of the 15 facilities contains nearly
half a million planetary images. The facilities maintain photographic
copies and digital data. In addition, several RPIFs offer
workstations for users to conduct on-site image and cartographic
processing. Each facility's general holdings, containing images of
planets and their satellites taken from both Earth and space, together
with topographic and geologic maps produced from these images, include
the following:
The Moon
Selected Earth-based telescopic photos
Ranger 7 through 9
Surveyor 1, 3, 5 through 7
Lunar Orbiter 1 through 5
Apollo 8, 10 through 17
Mercury
Mariner 10
Venus
Mariner 10
Pioneer Venus
Magellan
Mars and Its Satellites
Mariner 4, 6, 7, and 9
Viking Orbiter 1 and 2
Viking Lander 1 and 2
Jupiter and Its Satellites
Voyager 1 and 2
Pioneer 10 and 11
Saturn and Its Satellites
Voyager 1 and 2
Pioneer 11
Uranus, Neptune and their Satellites
Voyager 2
Each facility has a video disk system that allows users to rapidly
scan a collection of images. Additionally, holdings may be searched
through an on-line data catalog that is supported by the network of
RPIFs. Because the RPIFs are reference centers for studying and
selecting lunar and planetary images, images are not permitted to
leave except under exceptional circumstances. Reproductions of a few
photographs at the user's expense may be possible, however, data
managers are available to assist with the ordering of materials for
user's retention from the National Space Science Data Center (NSSDC)
in Greenbelt, Maryland.
Regional Planetary Image Facilities are located at the following
institutions in the United States and Overseas:
Space Imagery Center
Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
(602) 621-4861 Fax: (602) 621-4933
Arizona State University
Space Photography Laboratory
Department of Geology
Tempe, AZ 85287-1404
(602) 965-7029 Fax: (602) 965-8102
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
California Institute of Technology
Mail Stop 202-101
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena, CA 91109
(818) 354-3343 Fax: (818) 354-3437
Planetary Data Center
Brown University
Department of Geological Sciences
Box 1846
Providence, RI 02912
(401) 863-3243 Fax: (401) 863-3978
Cornell University
Spacecraft Planetary Image Facility
317 Space Sciences Building
Ithaca, NY 14853-6801
(607) 255-3833 Fax: (607) 255-9002
University of Hawaii
Pacific Regional Planetary Data Center
Planetary Geosciences Division
2525 Correa Road
Honolulu, HI 96822
(808) 956-3131 Fax: (808) 956-6322
Lunar and Planetary Institute
Center for Research and Information Services
3600 Bay Area Blvd.
Houston, TX 77058-1113
(713) 486-2136 or -2172 Fax: (713) 486-2153
Center for Earth and Planetary Studies
National Air and Space Museum
4th & Independence Avenue, S.W.
Room 3790
Smithsonian Institution
Washington, DC 20560
(202) 357-1457 Fax: (202) 786-2262 or -2566
U.S. Geological Survey
Branch of Astrogeology
2255 North Gemini Drive
Flagstaff, AZ 86001
(602) 556-7262 Fax: (602) 556-7090
Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences
Campus Box 1169
Washington University
St. Louis, MO 63130
(314) 935-6652 Fax: (314) 935-7361
OVERSEAS FACILITIES
DFVLR Oberpfaffenhofen
RPIF
NE-OE-PE
8031 Wessling
Germany
011 (49) 89 520-2417 Fax: 011 (49) 8153-2476
ISAS
Division of Planetary Science
3-1-1 Yoshinodai
Sagamihara
Kanagawa 229, Japan
011 (81) 427-51-3925 Fax: 011 (81) 427-59-4237
Phototheque Planetaire d'Orsay
Laboratoire de Geologie Dynamique Interne
Batiment 509
Universite Paris-Sud
F-91405 Orsay Cedex
France
011 (33) 1 69-41-61-49 or 51 Fax: 011 (33) 1 60-19-14-46
TELEX: FACORS 602166F
Southern-Europe RPIF
c/o Instituto di Astrofisicia Spaziale-CNR
Reparto di Planetologia
Viale dell'Universita' n. 11
00185 Rome
Italy
011 (39) 6 49-56-951
University of London Observatory
Observatory Annex and ULO Planetary Image Center
33-35 Daws Lane
Mill Hill
London NW7 4SD
England
Tel: 011 (44) 81 959 0421 Fax: 011 (44) 71 380 7145
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't wait for your ship
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | to come in, paddle out to
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | it.
|
| 550.35 | Planetary Data System (PDS) | MTWAIN::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Mon Jan 20 1992 16:47 | 110 |
| Article: 19693
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,sci.geo.geology,sci.misc
Subject: Planetary Data System Nodes
Date: 20 Jan 92 00:17:01 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Usenet)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
PLANETARY DATA SYSTEM NODES
The Planetary Data System (PDS) was created by NASA to provide a
cost-effective archive system for planetary data from both past and
present planetary missions. Sponsored by NASA's Solar System
Exploration Division and Communications Division, PDS provides a
system of organization and support that is designed to stimulate
research, facilitate data access, and support correlative analysis.
PDS is based upong a widely distributed and connected architecture
which allows data sets to remain in the user community where they are
most likey to be used and perpetuated, and where scientific expertise
is available to assist the research scientist.
PDS is divided into several discipline nodes located at
institutions throughout the United States. The Central Node resides
at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California, and maintains a
central catalog system used for locating and ordering data sets. In
addition, the Central Node provides overall project management,
develops and disseminates data standards, evaluates emerging
technologies, coordinates data ingestion and restoration activities,
and provides an interface to planetary missions. There are currently
six Discipline Nodes currently in the PDS. Each Discipline Node is a
service and research center having an expertise in a particular area
of planetary science, and maintains an inventory of data sets residing
at that node.
Atmospheres Node - Colorado University
Geologic Sciences Node - Washington University, MIssouri
Imaging Node - JPL & U.S. Geological Survey, Arizona
Planetary Rings Node - Ames Research Center, California
Planetary Plasma Interactions - UCLA, California
Small Bodies Node - University of Maryland
In addition to the six Discipline Nodes listed above, there is a
Navigation Ancillary Information Facilitiy (NAIF) located at JPL that
supplies data sets and software for computing observation geometry
used in the interpretation of space science data.
The addresses of each of the PDS nodes is listed below.
Central Node
Planetary Data System
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Mail Stop 525-3610
Pasadena, California 91109
(818) 306-6130 VAXmail: jplpds::pds_operator
Facsimile: (818) 306-6929
Atmospheres Node
University of Colorado
LASP
Campus Box 392
Boulder, CO 80309
Geologic Sciences Node
Washington University
Campus Box 1169
One Brookings Drive
St. Louis, MO 63130-4899
Fax: (314) 935-7361
Imaging Node
USGS
Astrogeology
2255 N. Gemini Dr.
Flagstaff, AZ 86001
Fax: (602) 556-7014
Planetary Plasma Interactions
UCLA
IGPP
Los Angeles, CA 90024
Fax: (310) 206-8042
Planetary Rings Node
NASA/AMES Research Center
MS 245-3
Moffett Field, CA 94035
Fax: (415) 604-6779
Small Bodies Node
University of Maryland
Astronomy Program
College Park, MD 20742
Fax: (301) 314-9067
Navigation Ancillary Information Facility
Jet Propulsion Lab
MS 301-125L
4800 Oak Grove Dr.
Pasadena, CA 91109
(818) 354-3869
Fax: (818) 393-6388
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't wait for your ship
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | to come in, paddle out to
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | it.
|
| 550.36 | The Small Planetary Mission Plan | VERGA::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Mon May 11 1992 17:32 | 110 |
| Article: 22434
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro
Subject: NASA Announces Plans for Small Planetary Missions
Date: 9 May 92 05:09:07 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Usenet)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Donald L. Savage
Headquarters, Washington, D.C. May 8, 1992
(Phone: 202/453-8400)
RELEASE: 92-63
NASA ANNOUNCES PLANS FOR SMALL PLANETARY MISSIONS
NASA today delivered a report to the U.S. Senate outlining a
shift in emphasis towards smaller, lower cost and more frequent
planetary missions. The Small Planetary Mission Plan, which was
requested by the Senate Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on
VA, HUD and Independent Agencies chaired by Sen. Barbara Mikulski
(D-Md.), describes two proposed missions that NASA has selected for
preliminary studies leading to launches in 1996 and 1998.
The two missions, part of the Discovery program, are the Mars
Environmental Survey (MESUR) Pathfinder, planned for launch in 1996,
and the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR), planned for a 1998
launch. Phase A studies of the MESUR Pathfinder mission have been
awarded to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. (JPL).
The Applied Physics Laboratory of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore,
Md. (APL), has been awarded Phase A studies of the NEAR mission.
"We're very excited about this plan," said Dr. Wesley T.
Huntress, Jr., Director of NASA's Solar System Exploration Division.
"It will enable more opportunities for planetary exploration without a
large budget impact. It will allow us to more effectively take
advantage of emerging technology and to quickly - and relatively
cheaply - undertake new missions of discovery. A significant benefit
will be increased student involvement because the shorter project
time-frames fit nicely with most academic degree programs."
According to the report, the plan emphasizes a recent change in
the character of NASA's Solar System Exploration Division's programs.
Most planetary missions of the past 2 decades have involved relatively
large spacecraft with broad science goals. There have been only a few
such missions per decade. The new, less expensive projects can be
launched more often, affording timely new opportunities to many
investigators and institutions. They also can fill in gaps in the
planetary exploration program and revitalize educational interest in
planetary science.
Small planetary missions, described in the report as the
centerpiece of NASA's new planetary programs for the 1990s, are
designed to proceed from definition to flight in less than 3 years,
combining well-defined objectives, proven instruments and flight
systems, strict cost limits and acceptance of a greater level of risk.
Most will be implemented by teams including substantial academic
representation.
The Discovery missions will be modeled on existing Explorer and
Earth Probe programs, with each mission costing no more than $150
million. The first Discovery mission, MESUR Pathfinder, is envisioned
as a technical demonstration and validation flight for the MESUR
program, scheduled to begin in 1999. The MESUR program calls for
building a network of about 16 small automated surface stations widely
scattered around Mars to study the planet's internal structure,
meteorology, and local surface properties.
NASA is studying the possibility of including a prototype of a
Mars micro-rover on the MESUR Pathfinder lander. The micro-rover,
currently under joint development by the Solar System Exploration
Division and NASA's Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology, would
carry a camera and one or two additional scientific instruments. The
lander also may include instruments provided by NASA's Office of
Exploration to search for subsurface ice and to measure soil toxicity.
A second concept under study, NEAR, would spend up to a year
station-keeping with a near-Earth asteroid. The NEAR spacecraft,
probably carrying only three instruments, would assess the asteroid's
mass, size, density and spin rate, map its surface topography and
composition, determine its internal properties, and study its
interaction with the interplanetary environment.
Other candidate Discovery missions listed in the report include a
Venus atmospheric probe, Earth-orbiting planetary telescopes, multiple
asteroid/comet flybys and comet reconnaissance missions, a Mars orbiter
to study the planet's upper atmosphere, and missions to Mars' moons.
Also included in the report to the Senate is the first phase of a
program called Toward Other Planetary Systems (TOPS-O), consisting of
ground-based observations to search for, identify, and examine Jupiter-
sized planets around other stars within 50 light-years of Earth. The
TOPS-O plan includes development of a second 10-meter telescope at the
Keck Observatory in Hawaii and enhanced instrumentation.
The Discovery and TOPS programs are managed by the Solar System
Exploration Division of the Office of Space Science and Applications,
at NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Denial is always the first
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | symptom.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
"Everything that can be invented has been invented"
- Charles H. Duell, Director, U.S. Patent Office, 1899
|
| 550.37 | It's bloody well about time! | PRAGMA::GRIFFIN | Dave Griffin | Mon May 11 1992 18:07 | 17 |
| I hope they can keep to these goals. The SSEC's last attempt at keeping
costs in line was the genesis of the Mariner Mark II spacecraft (of which
CRAF and Cassini are the first two units off the "production line").
The Mariner Mark II's were also supposed to keep costs in line by taking
advantage of modular components and common busses, etc. Still, when the
budget bucks run lean, everybody starts piling more onto the missions that
have funding, dragging it into overruns and other problems. Pretty soon
these missions (which were barely economical in the first place) became
incredibly expensive and magnets for budget slashers (witness CRAF's probe,
then CRAF, and now Cassini is hanging by a thread).
The Discovery program was also part of the SSEC's recommendations, and it
is high time it is getting the attention it deserves.
- dave
|
| 550.38 | | CHRCHL::GERMAIN | Improvise! Adapt! Overcome! | Tue May 12 1992 09:15 | 1 |
| I like the plan!
|
| 550.39 | History of Unmanned Lunar Exploration I | CARROL::LEPAGE | Jinky rules!!! | Tue Jun 23 1992 11:39 | 841 |
| I figured I'd post this article for those of you out there who
don't subscribe to EJASA. This article is the first in a series on the
history of unmanned lunar exploration programs from the dawn of the
Space Age to the present. I will be posting future articles in this
series as EJASA publishes them. My thanks to my friend and fellow noter,
Larry Klaes, for his superb editing job. Enjoy!
Drew
___________________________________________________________________________
THE ELECTRONIC JOURNAL OF
THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF THE ATLANTIC
Volume 3, Number 10 - May 1992
THE GREAT MOON RACE: IN THE BEGINNING...
Copyright (c) 1992 by Andrew J. LePage
The author gives permission to any group or individual wishing
to distribute this article, so long as proper credit is given
and the article is reproduced in its entirety.
Introduction
With each passing day it seems more and more likely that we will
be returning to Earth's Moon. The Soviet Union (now the Commonwealth
of Independent States) has been considering a lunar mapping mission
for over one decade. The United States has made a public commitment
to return to the Moon, starting with a mission to map and inventory
lunar resources. Already the GALILEO spacecraft, during its first
flyby of Earth in late 1990, made important observations of our only
natural satellite. GALILEO will make more lunar examinations on its
last flyby of our planet this December before finally heading to the
Jovian system.
The Japanese are also seriously considering probes to the Moon:
So far they have sent a pair of simple probes into lunar orbit as
part of an engineering test program. Plans for dropping landers on
the lunar surface later in this decade are already under way.
We finally seem to be at the threshold of the next round of lunar
exploration. This is the time to look back at the first round, which
started before most readers of this article can remember - in fact,
it started a few years before even I was born!. The world then was a
much different place than the one we live in today. We were in the
middle of the Cold War and at the very beginning of the Space Age, an
age which was ushered in by the Soviet Union with their launch of
SPUTNIK 1 in 1957. The myth of American technical superiority was
crumbling fast with each Soviet satellite launch.
The early Space Age was a time when the space programs of both
the Soviet Union and the United States were run, for all intents and
purposes, by the military. Indeed, only military missiles and their
derivatives were capable of placing payloads into Earth orbit or
beyond. As a result, the Soviet success in space was viewed as a
military threat and, more importantly to American politicians, a
global public relations threat.
It was also a time of total chaos in the American space program.
The space program was run by dozens of military and civilian agencies,
groups, and committees of various sizes, all struggling for their
piece of the New Frontier. What little guidance which was provided by
the Eisenhower Administration and Congress was often conflicting and
reflected the keen inter-service and inter-agency rivalries that had
developed over the previous decade. Against this backdrop, all
involved agreed that the Americans needed some spectacular space
firsts quickly. Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, it was realized that
the Soviets needed to stay ahead as proof of the superiority of
socialism.
The Military Lunar Missions
The battle lines in the United States were drawn on March 27,
1958. President Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) approved a
Department of Defense (DoD) plan that directed its newly created
Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) to fund two military
proposals to reach the Moon as part of America's contribution to the
International Geophysical Year (IGY). ARPA felt that a successful
military lunar mission would add credibility to the military presence
in space. It would also help prevent any civilian space agency that
might be formed from taking an important share of the space program
from them. In addition, the long-distance guidance and tracking
experience gained in the project would be useful for future programs.
Three of the launches would be performed by the United States Air
Force (USAF) and two by the United States Army.
The USAF was first up to bat with the more ambitious of the
two proposals. Only months after the launch of the first Earth
satellites, the USAF wanted to send a probe that would orbit the Moon.
Under contract by the USAF, Space Technology Laboratories (STL) built
an 84-pound (38-kilogram) spin-stabilized probe carrying 39 pounds
(18 kilograms) of scientific instruments. The orbiter was made of
fiberglass and consisted of a wide belt joining two flattened cones.
At the apex of one cone was a ring of eight vernier solid rockets
which were to be used to adjust the trajectory of the probe. At the
other end was a single Thiokol Falcon solid rocket motor that would be
fired once the probe approached the Moon so that it could enter lunar
orbit. Removable black and white stripes applied to the probe's
exterior surface were used for passive thermal control. Depending on
the anticipated thermal environment, which depended on the trajectory,
these strips could be added or removed before launch to achieve the
proper thermal balance.
The wide belt contained the control systems, batteries, radio,
and scientific instruments. These instruments included a spin-coil
magnetometer to measure magnetic fields, an ionization chamber and
proportional counter to measure radiation, sensors to monitor internal
temperatures, a special microphone 1.3 inches (3.3 centimeters) in
diameter to detect the impacts of micrometeoroids, and a simple camera.
The camera weighed only 14 ounces (400 grams) and consisted of a small
parabolic mirror that would focus infrared radiation received from the
Moon onto a special cell. A picture would be built up one line at a
time as the probe spinned. In case the probe should accidentally impact
the Moon, the spacecraft was decontaminated to minimize the chances
that organisms from Earth would corrupt any future biological lunar
investigations.
The launch vehicle that would send this probe on its way was the
THOR-ABLE Space Carrier. The THOR-ABLE was originally designed for
high-speed entry tests of USAF inter-continental ballistic missile
(ICBM) warheads. This two-stage version of the THOR-ABLE was first
used on April 23, 1958, but its payload fell short of the recovery
area. A second attempt on July 9 was considered successful. The
first stage was a USAF THOR intermediate-range ballistic missile
(IRBM) with a range of 1,600 miles (2,600 kilometers) and was built by
Douglas Aircraft. When THOR was authorized in November of 1955, it
was immediately given the highest national priority. Designed and
built in record time, the first SM-75 THOR was delivered to the USAF
in October of 1956, and the first flight test - a failure - took place
on January 25, 1957. After three more failures, it was successfully
tested on September 20. By the following June, THOR had completed its
test program and was ready to be made operational.
In the THOR-ABLE configuration, THOR's nuclear warhead was
replaced with an adapter skirt upon which the upper stages would sit.
The second stage was a Douglas modified unit originally used as the
second stage on the Navy's VANGUARD satellite launcher. In the ABLE
configuration, this stage was shortened by 11.6 feet (3.5 meters) and
the original Aerojet General AJ10-37 liquid propellant rocket engine
replaced by the slightly more powerful and efficient AJ10-42 engine.
The third stage was the same X-248 Altair solid motor built by
Allegany Ballistic Laboratory used in later versions of the VANGUARD.
The powered flight profile of the THOR-ABLE Space Carrier starts
with the ignition of the THOR booster. Ten seconds into the flight,
the launch vehicle begins a slow gravity turn to place it in the
proper injection angle. This gravity turn would stop 140 seconds into
powered flight. At an elapsed time of 159.5 seconds, the THOR booster
shuts down at an altitude of 59.3 miles (95.4 kilometers) and an
inertial velocity of 10,859 miles per hour (4,855 meters per second).
Next, the second stage ignites to bring the altitude and velocity to
194.3 miles (312.6 kilometers) and 16,033 mph (7,167 mps), respectively,
269.3 seconds into the flight. At 306.3 seconds elapsed time, the
third stage burns out. The altitude is 257.9 miles (415.0 kilometers)
and the final speed is 24,011 mph (10,734 mps).
The upper stages, although successfully used in the second
THOR-ABLE entry tests, had a poor record. By June of 1958, problems
in the second stage of the VANGUARD were responsible for three of
VANGUARD's five failures. At the time, the upper stages of the
VANGUARD operated correctly only once, to place the VANGUARD 1
satellite into Earth orbit on March 17, 1958. Theoretically, if the
THOR-ABLE Space Carrier worked properly, this launch vehicle could
place 350 pounds (160 kilograms) of payload into a 300-mile (480-
kilometer) high orbit or 85 pounds (39 kilograms) into a direct
ascent escape trajectory.
The first lunar launch, in the glare of the world press, was
attempted on August 17, 1958 using the THOR-ABLE 1 launch vehicle.
At 7:14 A.M. local time, the rocket lifted off Pad 17A on the Atlantic
Missile Range (AMR) in Florida. Everything proceeded as planned until
77 seconds into the flight, when the turbo-pump in the first stage
engine seized, causing the THOR 127 booster to explode. It was a
depressing start for the program and an omen of things to come.
NASA Gets into the Game
The August 17 launch attempt would prove to be the one and only
purely military Moon shot. During 1958 the United States Congress
created a civilian space agency called the National Aeronautics and
Space Administration (NASA). When it officially came into existence
on October 1, 1958, President Eisenhower transferred control of all
scientific space projects, including the ARPA Moon missions, to NASA.
NASA would direct the last four Moon missions while the USAF and the
Army would continue their involvement as "executive agents". NASA
designated this series of probes PIONEER.
Another THOR-ABLE was quickly assembled and prepared for what
would be NASA's first space probe launch. At 3:42 A.M. on October 11,
PIONEER 1 was successfully launched - or so it seemed at first. After
the probe separated from the third stage, the velocity was found to
be 340 mph (152 meters per second) short of its target, due to the
premature shutdown of the carrier rocket's second stage. Attempts to
increase the probe's velocity using the eight vernier rocket motors
did not help. PIONEER 1 reached a peak altitude of 70,700 miles
(114,000 kilometers) before it arced back towards Earth and burned up
over the South Pacific Ocean 43 hours, 17 minutes, and 30 seconds
after launch.
While PIONEER 1 failed its primary mission, it did return some
data indicating that the Van Allen radiation belts discovered earlier
that year by EXPLORER 1 extended to an altitude of 5,000 to 7,000
miles (8,000 to 11,000 kilometers) at Earth's equator and then
tapered off at an altitude of 9,320 miles (15,000 kilometers). In
addition, eleven micrometeoroid impacts were detected. Still,
PIONEER's failure to reach the Moon was yet another big blow.
One lunar month later, PIONEER 2 and its THOR-ABLE launch vehicle
was ready for launch. The guidance system of this THOR-ABLE was
modified to incorporate a Doppler command system to minimize the
velocity errors that occurred previously. On November 7, the last USAF
lunar attempt lifted off. The first two stages operated as planned,
but this time the third stage failed to ignite. PIONEER 2 reached a
peak altitude of 963 miles (1,550 kilometers) before it plunged back
to a fiery entry 42.4 minutes after launch. During its brief journey,
PIONEER 2 detected a flurry of micrometeoroid impacts reaching a rate
as high as sixteen hits per minute. Later analysis cast doubt on this
data, since it was found that thermal variations can cause spurious
signals with the sort of detector carried by the PIONEERs.
While the USAF PIONEER probes never accomplished their primary
mission, they did provide important engineering information and data
on the then little understood near-Earth environment. These missions
demonstrated that a dynamically stable, spinning spacecraft could be
designed, built, and operated. The thermal control scheme also
operated as intended. This project also provided experience in
tracking and controlling distant spacecraft, skills which would be
put to good use in the future.
Next up were the Army PIONEERs. This pair of probes were modest
compared to the USAF probes, as they would only attempt a simple lunar
flyby. The project had its origins in an early 1956 Army Ballistic
Missile Agency (ABMA) and Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) proposal to
use a modified JUPITER IRBM to launch two deep probes during the IGY.
Once funded by ARPA, the Army contracted JPL to build two small
fiberglass probes weighing about 13 pounds (5.9 kilograms) each.
They would be 20 inches (51 centimeters) long, ending in a 9-inch
(23-centimeter) wide cone with a 3-inch (8-centimeter) spike antenna.
The probe was gold plated and striped with paint for passive thermal
control. The electrically conductive gold plating on the cone also
served as an unsymmetrical dipole antenna element in conjunction with
the spike antenna.
At the base of the probes was a despin mechanism which consisted
of two 60-inch (1.5-meter) long weighted wires. As the wires unwound,
the payload's spin would decrease from 415 to 11 revolutions per
minute. Located inside of the probe was a 1.1-pound (500-gram)
transmitter with an effective power of 180 milliwatts. Three
telemetry channels were used to carry engineering and science data.
The power supply for the transmitter and instruments consisted of
eighteen mercury cells.
Two Geiger-Mueller tubes and the required electronics were used to
obtain data on the radiation environment between Earth, the Moon, and
hopefully beyond. A photoelectric triggering device was also carried
as an engineering test for future systems. This device was incapable
of producing images and had to be closer than 20,000 miles (32,000
kilometers) to the Moon in order to operate.
The launch vehicle to be used was the ABMA's JUNO 2, developed by
the team lead by German rocket pioneer Wernher von Braun (1912-1977).
The JUNO 2 consisted of a modified JUPITER IRBM topped with a
modified version of the solid rocket cluster used as the upper stage
of the JUNO 1 launch vehicle. The SM-78 JUPITER originated in a joint
Army-Navy proposal in 1955 to build an IRBM with a range of 1,600
miles (2,600 kilometers). By November of 1956, as the result of a
Department of Defense policy change that forbade the Army from
deploying missiles with a range in excess of 200 miles (320 kilometers),
it was decided that the USAF would deploy the missile after it was
developed by the ABMA.
Flight testing began on March 1, 1957. In November of 1957, the
prime contractor, Chrysler, began delivery of the JUPITER at the rate
of four units per month. By July of 1958, 38 JUPITERs had been
launched with a record of 29 successes and 7 partial successes. In
August, deliveries of operational JUPITERs to the USAF began.
As the first stage of the JUNO 2 launch vehicle, the propellant
tanks of the JUPITER were lengthened by 3.0 feet (0.92 meters) to
increase the burn time by twenty seconds. Mounted on top of the first
stage under an aerodynamic shroud was the instrument compartment and a
JPL developed, three-stage solid rocket cluster. Modifications of
this cluster from the version used on the JUNO 1 included increased
thrust of the third and fourth stages and changing the titanium casing
of the fourth stage to stainless steel.
After the first stage shut down, it would separate using small
lateral thrusters. The shroud would then be jettisoned. The
instrument compartment contained a spin table to spin up the upper
stages and payload for stability. It would also keep the upper stages
oriented during the coast phase using four pairs of compressed air
thrusters. After a predetermined period, the second stage - consisting
of a ring of eleven modified SERGEANT rockets - would fire. Nine
seconds later, the third stage cluster of three SERGEANTs would
ignite, followed nine seconds later by the fourth stage consisting of
a single modified SERGEANT rocket.
The upper stage cluster of the JUNO 2, when used with the JUPITER
C (an ABMA developed rocket for high speed entry tests of a scale
JUPITER IRBM warhead) and JUNO 1 launch vehicle (essentially a JUPITER
C with a fourth stage attached), was quite reliable if somewhat
inaccurate, due to the inconsistent performance of early solid rocket
motors. All three JUPITER C flights were successful and only two of
the three JUNO 1 failures were due to an upper stage malfunction. It
operated successfully three times, orbiting EXPLORERs 1, 3, and 4. A
75-percent success record was excellent in these early days of the
Space Age.
Theoretically, the JUNO 2 could place 95 pounds (43 kilograms)
of payload in a 300-mile (480-kilometer) high Earth orbit, send a
500-pound (230-kilogram) payload vertically to an altitude of 1,800
miles (2,900 kilometers) or 30 pounds (14 kilograms) to 11,000 miles
(17,700 kilometers). Most important to PIONEER, the JUNO 2 was
capable of sending 15 pounds (7 kilograms) of useful payload on a
direct ascent escape trajectory.
The first NASA/Army/JPL Moon probe, PIONEER 3, lifted off from Pad
5 at the Atlantic Missile Range at 12:45 AM on December 6, 1958. The
JUPITER AM-11 booster cut-off 3.7 seconds early and with the flight
path one degree lower than planned. After the upper stages fired
successfully, PIONEER 3 was traveling at 23,606 mph (10,550 meters per
second), well under the 24,240 mph (10,834 meters per second) required
to reach the Moon. It was also discovered that the despin mechanism
failed to operate as intended.
As a result, PIONEER 3 reached a peak altitude of only 63,580
miles (102,300 kilometers) before it returned to its destruction
over French Equatorial Africa 38 hours and six minutes after launch.
During its unintended ballistic flight, PIONEER 3 was able to make
measurements that confirmed the extent of Earth's previously known
radiation belt, as well as discover a second belt extending 10,000
miles (16,000 kilometers) above Earth, before fading out at a distance
of 40,000 miles (64,000 kilometers). While an important discovery,
it still did not make up for the fact that yet another American
spacecraft failed to reach the Moon. Another PIONEER and JUNO 2 were
prepared in hopes that the last of the original ARPA funded missions
would be the first to the Moon. But it was not meant to be.
First Again
The United States was not the only country that wished to reach
the Moon first. The Soviet Union was also working actively to be
the first. On September 26, 1954, the Soviet Union announced that a
rocket for interplanetary missions had been designed and the flight
principles worked out. That fall, the Interdepartmental Commission
on Interplanetary Communications was formed to study various space
related projects. On April 26, 1955, the Soviets announced that they
were studying plans to explore the Moon. By the summer of 1957, it
was clear to the West that the Soviets had developed the first ICBM.
The point was driven home with the launch of SPUTNIK 1 on October 4
of that year using their new ICBM.
After the launch of SPUTNIK 3 on May 15, 1958, the Soviets
publicly appeared to be very quiet. Still, Western intelligence
agencies had detected unsuccessful launches of some sort of rocket
launched from Soviet Central Asia on May 1, June 25, September 22, and
November 15 of 1958. All were perfectly timed to reach the Moon but
none of them did.
Finally, on January 2, 1959, the Soviet Union announced the launch
LUNA 1 or MECHTA (Dream, in Russian). The Soviets' first acknowledged
Moon probe consisted of two polished aluminum-magnesium alloy
hemispheres four feet (1.2 meters) across, bolted together at their
equator. The interior, which held the transmitters, batteries,
instruments, and other electronics, was pressurized to 1.3 Earth
atmospheres. Combined with patterned surfaces and thermal louvers,
this helped maintain the interior at a temperature of about 68 degrees
Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius). The probe was neither spin-stabilized
nor had an attitude control system. It relied on the tumbling brought
about at separation from its escape stage to even out solar heating.
On the exterior were four rod antennae for communication and the
sensors for the instruments.
The instruments carried by this probe included a boom mounted
magnetometer, an ammonium phosphate piezo-electric micrometeoroid
detector covering about an area of two square feet (0.2 square
meters), and radiation detectors. This roughly spherical 795.6 pound
(361.3 kilogram) probe was far larger than anything the United States
could launch. The escape stage that followed LUNA 1 after its
ejection also carried a tracking and telemetry transmitter,
instruments to study cosmic rays, and 2.2 pounds (1 kilogram) of
sodium. The sodium was released 70,000 miles (113,000 kilometers)
from Earth to produce a luminous cloud to locate the spacecraft as
well as study Earth's magnetic field.
The rocket used to launch LUNA 1 into its direct ascent trajectory
to the Moon was a modified version of the Soviet's first ICBM, the
R-7. With a liftoff thrust in excess of 1.1 million pounds (500
metric tons), it was almost three times more powerful than its
American equivalent, the ATLAS. Not until the first test flights of
the SATURN 1 two years later would the United States have anything to
compare to this truly huge rocket.
Development of the R-7, also known in the West as the SS-6 or by
its NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) codename, SAPWOOD, began
in the early 1950s under the direction of Sergi Korolev (1906-1966).
Unlike the Americans, who had an effective fleet of long-range bombers
to deliver nuclear weapons, the Soviets decided to develop an ICBM to
counter this threat. Since the first generation Soviet nuclear
weapons were much larger than their American counterparts, the Soviets
were forced to build a very large missile to lift their nuclear bombs
over intercontinental distances.
The missile Korolev designed made use of parallel staging: Four
boosters and the core would ignite simultaneously four seconds before
liftoff. This was done since little was known at the time about the
dynamics of igniting rocket engines at altitude. When the propellant
in the boosters was depleted two minutes into the flight they were
jettisoned, leaving the core to continue until its propellant also was
gone. In its role as an ICBM, the R-7 had a range of about 6,000
miles (10,000 kilometers). It made its first test flight on August 3,
1957, and its first full range flight on August 27.
It was recognized early on that the R-7 would also make an
excellent launch vehicle. The R-7 launched the first artificial
satellite, SPUTNIK 1, on October 4, 1957, to the surprise of the West.
Following three more orbital launch attempts, of which two were
successful, the limits of the basic R-7 design had been reached.
Modified so that a small Block E stage could be mounted on top of it,
this new launch vehicle, later modified to become the VOSTOK launch
booster, was able to increase the payload that the basic R-7 could
carry to Earth orbit from about 1.5 tons (1.35 metric tons) to
an incredible five tons (4.5 metric tons). It also allowed the
launching of a little less than 0.5 ton (0.45 metric ton) on
escape trajectories.
Although originally intended to hit the Moon, LUNA 1 passed within
3,700 miles (6,000 kilometers) of the lunar surface about 34 hours
after launch. LUNA 1 continued to transmit for another 28 hours to a
distance of 371,000 miles (597,000 kilometers) before heading off into
a solar orbit with a perihelion of 91.0 million miles (146.4 million
kilometers), an aphelion of 122.6 million miles (197.2 million
kilometers), and a period of 443 days. Another probable launch
failure of a Soviet LUNA spacecraft occurred on January 9. Despite
this, the Soviets had two more space firsts to add to their growing
list: The first lunar flyby and the first artificial planet in the
solar system. The United States had lost again.
Success...Sort of
With their hopes to be first to the Moon dashed, the last Moon
probe originally funded by ARPA, PIONEER 4, was launched on March 3,
1959. PIONEER 4 was almost identical to PIONEER 3 except for some
lead shielding added to one of its Geiger-Mueller radiation counters.
This time, the second stage fired for one second longer than planned
which, combined with aiming errors, resulted in the small JPL built
probe not only escaping Earth's gravity but also missing the Moon by
37,300 miles (60,000 kilometers) at a speed of 4,300 mph (1,900 meters
per second).
While PIONEER 4 passed too far from the Moon for its optical
trigger device to operate, it did return useful data on the radiation
environment until its batteries ran down 82 hours after launch at a
distance of 407,000 miles (655,000 kilometers). Had the transmitter
continued to operate, it was felt that communications could have been
maintained to a distance of more than 700,000 miles (1.1 million
kilometers). While PIONEER 4 was not the first to the Moon, at least
it gave the Americans a long distance communications record and their
first heliocentric satellite.
After another probable launch failure on June 16, 1959, the
Soviets successfully launched their second officially acknowledged
Moon probe, LUNA 2, on September 12. It was essentially identical to
LUNA 1 except for an improved magnetometer, an upgraded micrometeoroid
detector to improve the counting rate, and a modified antenna housing.
As with LUNA 1, its escape stage released a cloud of sodium vapor at a
distance of 97,000 miles (156,000 kilometers) which expanded to 400
miles (650 kilometers) in diameter during its outward trip.
Unlike its predecessor, LUNA 2 and its escape stage successfully
hit the Moon at a speed of 7,400 mph (3,300 meters per second) on
September 13 at 21:02.14 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) at thirty degrees
north latitude on the lunar equator, at the edge of Mare Imbrium near
the crater Archimedes. There were reports of sightings of the dust
cloud kicked up by the impact, but the lack of similar sightings by
impacts of larger spacecraft in later years cast doubts on their
authenticity.
Measurements made by LUNA 2 indicated that there was no
discernible lunar magnetic field down to an altitude of 34 miles
(55 kilometers) and that the Moon had no radiation belts similar
to Earth's. About 6,000 miles (10,000 kilometers) above the lunar
surface, a region of ionized gas was detected. To leave no doubt to
future generations as to who made it to the Moon first, LUNA 2 carried
two small spheres, one 3.5 inches (9 centimeters) and the other 6
inches (15 centimeters) in diameter, made up of small pendants
engraved with the Soviet Coat of Arms designed to scatter over the
lunar surface upon impact. After the mission, Soviet authorities
assured the West that LUNA 2 and its escape stage had been sterilized
to prevent any Earth organisms from reaching the Moon.
Photographing the Unknown
Less than one month later, the Soviets launched the most advanced
Moon probe to date. On October 4, 1959, LUNA 3 - also known as the
Automatic Interplanetary Station (AIS) - was launched towards the Moon.
This probe was much different from the previous LUNA explorers. Its
design was a cylinder capped by two hemispheres with a total length of
about 4.3 feet (1.3 meters) and a diameter of about 3.90 feet (1.19
meters). The 613.3-pound (278.5-kilogram) probe was covered with
banks of solar cells to recharge chemical storage batteries which
provided electrical power, the first Soviet spacecraft ever to do
so. The spacecraft was spin stabilized in part for thermal control.
Additional thermal control was provided by rectangular thermal
shutters between the banks of solar cells as well as fans inside
LUNA 3 that circulated the gas inside, which was pressurized to 0.23
Earth atmospheres. These measures kept the interior temperature
between 77 and 86 degrees Fahrenheit (25 and 30 degrees Celsius).
In addition to instruments to detect micrometeoroids and cosmic
rays, LUNA 3 carried the first photo-television imaging system which
was to be used to photograph the hemisphere of the Moon previously
unseen from Earth. This system consisted of a 200mm, f/5.6 wide-angle
lens as well as a 500mm f/9.5 lens for more detailed photographs. At
least 29 exposures of a special radiation resistant 35 mm isochrome
film were carried. Once exposed, the film was automatically developed
onboard the spacecraft, after which it was scanned by a light beam
with a maximum resolution of one thousand lines per image. The images
were then transmitted to Earth at one of two speeds: A slow speed for
the initial transmission far from Earth and a higher speed for when
the probe was closer.
In order for LUNA 3 to be placed into a precise orbit that would
take it past the Moon at the prescribed distance, the escape stage was
equipped with a radio guidance system that allowed ground controllers
to shut down the engine at just the right moment. The Block E escape
stage also carried 344.6 pounds (156.5 kilograms) of additional
instruments and other equipment. After passing only 4,300 miles
(6,900 kilometers) above the lunar south polar region, LUNA 3 was
swung upwards towards a vantage point where it could view seventy
percent of the Moon's far side.
On October 7 at 3:30 GMT, with LUNA 3 only 40,500 miles (65,200
kilometers) from the Moon, attitude control jets were fired to stop
the spin of the probe and align its camera with the Moon. For the
next forty minutes, LUNA 3 took the first photographs of the lunar
far side. Once the photographs were taken, the spacecraft was
spun up again and continued in a new orbit (as a result of lunar
perturbations) around Earth with an apogee of 300,000 miles (480,000
kilometers) and a perigee of 29,500 miles (47,500 kilometers), an
inclination of eighty degrees, and a period of about fifteen days.
This new orbit allowed LUNA 3 to appear high in the Soviet sky to
facilitate transmission of these historic photographs.
The first transmission of the images took place at low speed while
the probe was still quite distant from Earth. Although the quality
was poor due to the transmission distance and the far from ideal
lighting of the lunar surface, the images did reveal many new features
on the far side and showed that, unlike the familiar hemisphere which
always faces Earth, it was nearly devoid of large maria ("seas"), the
vast beds of hardened lava. A second transmission of these photographs
at closer range apparently never occurred as planned due to a spacecraft
failure. Still, the Soviets secured yet another important space first.
Possible attempts to fly an improved version of LUNA 3 failed on April
12 and 18 in 1960. These were to be the last of the first generation
Soviet missions to the Moon.
Final Gamble
After the fiasco with ARPA's first five lunar probe attempts, NASA
decided to build and launch its own set of PIONEER-class missions in
this first round of lunar exploration. They were the most advanced
American spacecraft to date. This new PIONEER was a sphere 39
inches (0.99 meters) in diameter that weighed in at 387 pounds (176
kilograms). Attached to the exterior were four paddles covered with
1,100 solar cells that would be deployed after separation from its
launch vehicle. At each end of the probe was a small rocket engine;
one to be used in bursts of up to four seconds for course corrections
and the other to brake the probe into lunar orbit when it was only
5,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) from the Moon. The hydrazine
propellant for these engines was kept in a 26-inch (66-centimeter)
diameter sphere inside the probe. The hydrazine would spontaneously
decompose inside the throat of the engines after it had passed over a
bed of aluminum oxide catalyst.
Thermal control was provided by fifty four-blade blue and white
butterfly fans. These fans were controlled by metal coils. As they
heated and expanded, the butterfly fans would open, exposing more
white and less blue to reflect heat. When cooled, the butterfly fans
would close, exposing more blue to allow more heat to be absorbed.
This more complex thermal control system was required due to the
amount of instrumentation carried and the more demanding mission.
Each probe carried a variety of instruments to measure the
magnetic and radiation environment around the Moon. Instruments
included two magnetometers, a high radiation counter, an ionization
chamber, Geiger-Mueller counters, a low-energy radiation counter, a
plasma probe, and a scintillation spectrometer to measure the energy
of solar protons. In addition, a simple television scanner was
carried to return images of the lunar surface from orbit.
The launch vehicle chosen for this lunar orbiter was the ATLAS-
ABLE, which was specifically designed for high-speed missions such as
this. The first stage consisted of a modified Convair built ATLAS D
ICBM. The ATLAS program began in February of 1954 when an ICBM was
recognized to be feasible. Convair, because of its previous ICBM
development work with the MX-774 test missile from 1946 to 1948, was
chosen as the prime contractor for Weapon System 107A (later known as
SM-65 ATLAS) in January of 1955. By June of that year, the project
was given the highest national priority, a status later shared by the
THOR IRBM.
Like the Soviet R-7, the ATLAS made use of parallel staging. At
launch, two booster engines - along with a sustainer engine - ignited,
drawing fuel from a common set of propellant tanks. The booster
engines were later jettisoned, leaving the sustainer to continue with
powered flight. The first model, the ATLAS A, was a research vehicle
that made use of only the booster engines. Testing began with ATLAS
4A, which failed on June 11, 1957. Not until the third launch with
ATLAS 12A on December 17 did the system finally work properly. When
the last ATLAS A was launched in March of 1958, a total of eight had
been launched with only three successes.
The first ATLAS B, which had a full complement of engines, was
tested in July of 1958 and failed. The second flight, on August 2,
did succeed however. The ATLAS finally flew at full range in
November. On December 18, a stripped down ATLAS B was launched into
Earth orbit carrying a recorded message from President Eisenhower as
part of Project Score. By the end of the ATLAS B program on February
4, 1959, ten ATLAS B missiles had been launched with six successes.
The ATLAS C was used for additional testing and training of
Strategic Air Command (SAC) missile crews. Eventually deployed in
limited numbers, the ATLAS C was armed with a General Electric (GE) Mk
2 warhead and employed a radio guidance system which, while much more
accurate than the inertial guidance systems of the day, prevented
salvo launches. During its test program, which ran from December 23,
1958 to August 24 the following year, only three ATLAS C missiles met
their objectives out of six attempts.
The ATLAS D (SM-65D), outfitted with a GE Mk 3 warhead and an
improved inertial guidance system that relied on ground commands for
periodic updates, was meant to be deployed operationally in semi-hard
coffin installations. It was later used as the booster for launch
vehicles. The first test launch in April of 1959 failed as well as
the next three attempts. The first ATLAS D to meet it goals was
launched on July 28. After another successful flight from the Pacific
Missile Range in California on September 9, the ATLAS D was declared
"operational", if not yet very reliable.
The upper stages of the ATLAS-ABLE were nearly identical to those
used in the not so successful THOR-ABLE. Major differences appeared
in the second stage, which included lengthening it by 2.1 feet (0.65
meters) and substituting an Aerojet AJ10-101 engine for the AJ10-42
used earlier. By the fall of 1959, this upper stage combination,
along with its close relative, the VANGUARD, still had an abysmal
success record: Two out of three USAF THOR-ABLE entry tests were
flown successfully (although the payload was only recovered once).
Out of the five flights of the THOR-ABLE Space Carrier, only the
launch of the 142-pound (64-kilogram) EXPLORER 6 satellite into an
elongated Earth orbit on August 7, 1959 was successful. The upper
stages were responsible for three of the four launch failures. The
upper stages of the VANGUARD continued their poor performance, racking
up only two additional successes since the launch of VANGUARD 1. The
upper stages were found responsible for six of the eight VANGUARD
launch failures.
In total, the ABLE combination had flown successfully only six
times out of sixteen opportunities. Combined with the record of the
ATLAS, things were bound to go wrong. On paper, the ATLAS-ABLE launch
vehicle was capable of placing 1,500 pounds (680 kilograms) of payload
into a 300-mile (480-kilometer) Earth orbit, or place 100 pounds (45
kilograms) directly into a Clarke orbit, or 200 pounds (90 kilograms)
into a direct ascent escape trajectory into interplanetary space. It
had just enough power to hurl the new PIONEERs to the Moon.
This new series of PIONEER Moon probes suffered its first set back
on September 10, 1959, when ATLAS-ABLE 1 caught fire and exploded on
the launch pad during a static firing test, fortunately without the
payload attached. Finally, on November 26, ATLAS-ABLE 4, with ATLAS
20D as the booster and a PIONEER orbiter designated P-3 as the payload,
lifted off from Pad 14 on the Atlantic Missile Range. About 45 seconds
into the flight, the fiberglass payload shroud ripped away, prematurely
ending the mission.
Another attempt would not take place for over one year. On
September 26, 1960, ATLAS-ABLE 5A, carrying a PIONEER orbiter payload
designated P-30, lifted off from Pad 12. While the ATLAS 80D booster
operated as intended, the second stage failed to develop full thrust
and shut down early. The payload was destroyed upon entry seventeen
minutes after launch. The last PIONEER orbiter, P-31, was launched on
December 15 of that same year using ATLAS-ABLE 5B. Like so many ATLAS
flights at that time, the ATLAS 91D booster exploded at an altitude of
40,000 feet (12,000 meters) after only 68 seconds of powered flight.
NASA's first probes to the Moon suffered the same fate as all
but one of the original ARPA Moon missions: Ending up as either
debris on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean or as fine dust in the
upper atmosphere. While the Soviets appear to have suffered from their
share of failures, their successes were spectacular. In this first
round of the race to the Moon, the Soviets clearly won, not only in
their eyes but in the eyes of the United States and the rest of the
world. The stage was now set for the next round in the race to reach
the Moon.
Summary of Lunar Probe Launches, 1958-1960
_______________________________________________________________________
Name Launch Country Weight Launch
Date lbs (kg) Vehicle
_______________________________________________________________________
(Unannounced) May 1, 1958 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar impact mission
(Unannounced) Jun 25, 1958 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar impact mission
(PIONEER 0) Aug 17, 1958 US 83.8 (38.0) THOR-ABLE
Failed lunar orbiter attempt
(Unannounced) Sep 22, 1958 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar impact mission
PIONEER 1 Oct 11, 1958 US 84.4 (38.3) THOR-ABLE
Failed lunar orbiter attempt
PIONEER 2 Nov 8, 1958 US 87.3 (39.6) THOR-ABLE
Failed lunar orbiter attempt
(Unannounced) Nov 15, 1958 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar impact mission
PIONEER 3 Dec 6, 1958 US 12.95 (5.88) JUNO 2
Failed lunar flyby attempt
LUNA 1 Jan 2, 1959 USSR 795.6 (361.3) VOSTOK
Failed lunar impact attempt; first lunar flyby
(Unannounced) Jan 9, 1959 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar impact mission
PIONEER 4 Mar 3, 1959 US 13.4 (6.09) JUNO 2
Distant lunar flyby; first US probe in solar orbit
(Unannounced) Jun 16, 1959 USSR 790 (360)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar probe
LUNA 2 Sep 12, 1959 USSR 859.2 (390.2) VOSTOK
First lunar impact
LUNA 3 Oct 4, 1959 USSR 613.3 (278.5) VOSTOK
First lunar photographic flyby of far side
(ATLAS-ABLE 4) Nov 26, 1959 US 372 (169) ATLAS-ABLE
(P-3) Failed lunar orbiter attempt
(Unannounced) Apr 12, 1960 USSR 615 (280)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar photographic flyby
(Unannounced) Apr 18, 1960 USSR 615 (280)? VOSTOK
Possible launch failure of lunar photographic flyby
(ATLAS-ABLE 5A) Sep 25, 1960 US 387 (176) ATLAS-ABLE
(P-30) Failed lunar orbiter attempt
(ATLAS-ABLE 5B) Dec 14, 1960 US 388 (176) ATLAS-ABLE
(P-31) Failed lunar orbiter attempt
_____________________________________________________________________
NOTES: Probe names given in () are used if no official name exists.
Weights given are the launch weights of the probes and do
not include any additional equipment that may have been
carried by the escape stage.
_____________________________________________________________________
Bibliography -
Barabashov, N. P., A. A. Mikhailov, and Yu. N. Lipsky, AN ATLAS
OF THE MOON'S FARSIDE, 1961
Boehm, Josef, Hans J. Fichtner, and Otto A. Hoberg, "EXPLORER
Satellites Launched by JUNO 1 and JUNO 2 Space Carrier Vehicles",
ASTRONAUTICAL ENGINEERING AND SCIENCE, 1963
Brockman, M. H., H. R. Buchanan, R. L. Choate, and L. R. Malling,
"Extraterrestrial Radio Tracking and Communication", PROCEEDINGS OF
THE I.R.E., April, 1960
Burrows, William E., EXPLORING SPACE: VOYAGES IN THE SOLAR SYSTEM
AND BEYOND, 1990
Clark, Phillip S., THE SOVIET MANNED SPACE PROGRAM, 1988
Emme, Eugene M., AERONAUTICS AND ASTRONAUTICS: AN AMERICAN CHRONOLOGY
OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE EXPLORATION OF SPACE 1915-1960, 1961
Gatland, Kenneth, THE ILLUSTRATED ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SPACE TECHNOLOGY,
1988
Gatland, Kenneth, ROBOT EXPLORERS, 1972
Gunston, Bill, THE ILLUSTRATED ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE WORLD'S ROCKETS
AND MISSILES, 1979
Johnson, Nicholas, HANDBOOK OF SOVIET LUNAR AND PLANETARY
EXPLORATION, 1979
Josias, Conrad S., "Radiation Instrumentation Electronics for the
PIONEER III and IV Space Probes"; PROCEEDINGS OF THE I.R.E., April, 1960
Lange, Oswald H., and Richard J. Stein, SPACE CARRIER VEHICLES, 1963
Ordway, Fredrick I. III, "A Chronology of Space Carrier Vehicles,
1957 through 1962", ASTRONAUTICAL ENGINEERING AND SCIENCE, 1963
Pickering, William H., "History of the JUNO Cluster System";
ASTRONAUTICAL ENGINEERING AND SCIENCE, 1963
Von Braun, Wernher, and Fredrick I. Ordway III, HISTORY OF ROCKETRY
AND SPACE TRAVEL, 1966
Wilson, Andrew, (JANE'S) SOLAR SYSTEM LOG, 1987
MAJOR NASA LAUNCHES, Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Historical Report
No. 1A, circa 1987
About the Author -
Andrew J. LePage is a member of the Boston Group for the Study
of the Soviet Space Program, Krasnaya Orbita. In addition to his
interests in astronomical and space related topics, Andrew has been
a serious observer of the Soviet space program for over one decade.
Andrew is the author of the following EJASA articles:
"Mars 1994" - March 1990
"The Great Moon Race: The Soviet Story, Part One" - December 1990
"The Great Moon Race: The Soviet Story, Part Two" - January 1991
"The Mystery of ZOND 2" - April 1991
"The Great Moon Race: New Findings" - May 1991
THE ELECTRONIC JOURNAL OF THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF THE ATLANTIC
May 1992 - Vol. 3, No. 10
Copyright (c) 1992 - ASA
|
| 550.40 | SURVEYOR Lunar Lander Project (JPL) | VERGA::KLAES | Slaves to the Metal Hordes | Wed Jul 01 1992 12:58 | 120 |
| Article: 24190
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,comp.robotics
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: Surveyor/Rover Fact Sheet
Sender: [email protected] (Usenet)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Wed, 1 Jul 1992 07:57:36 GMT
Here's the fact sheet that was passed out at the Mars Rover symposium
at JPL last Friday.
____________________________________________________
SURVEYOR'S SILVER ANNIVERSARY -- BACKGROUND FACT SHEET
A little more than twenty-five years ago, in the spring of 1967,
a remote-controlled machine called Surveyor III was scratching shallow
trenches in the surface of the Moon. The seven launches and five
successful lunar landings of JPL's Surveyor Project spanned the period
from late May 1966 through early 1968.
Surveyor was the first man-made system to operate on the surface
of another celestial body. Scattered across a lunar near-side
equatorial band, the Surveyor landers (except the last one) had the
objective of checking the terrain and its properties in preparation
for the manned Apollo landings, which followed in 1969-72. Surveyor
VII was landed in the southern lunar highlands near the crater Tycho
for purely scientific exploration.
Weighing about a ton on Earth and standing about eight feet tall
on three splayed-out legs, the Surveyor spacecraft were in the first
generation of American planetary spacecraft. They were designed to
make simple measurements in the act of landing, to observe the landing
site with a panning and elevating TV camera, and to do simple analyses
of soil mechanics and composition.
The Surveyors were launched from Kennedy Space Center aboard
Atlas/Centaur rockets and landed under their own power some 65 hours
later, in the lunar morning. Those which landed successfully were
operated (by remote control from Earth) until past the lunar sunset,
about two Earth weeks later; some were reawakened on later lunar days.
Contact was lost with Surveyors II and IV before landing.
The most abundant data return was images--analog still- picture
television, with a choice of wide-angle (25mm) or narrow- angle
(100mm) focal length. A total of nearly 90,000 TV frames were taken
by the five successful landers, many of them arrayed in panoramic
mosaics. Most of the pictures were taken during the first lunar day
after landing, but Surveyors I and V took about 1,000 on the second
lunar day and Surveyor V took 64 more on the fourth lunar day.
Images were used for everything from locating the spacecraft on
the lunar surface to determining the bearing strength of the soil by
observing how deep the spacecraft feet had sunk into it. Surveyor III
bounced twice in landing. Surveyor VI was deliberately "hopped" about
2.4 meters (almost 8 feet) several days after landing, presenting
additional footprints and jet- blown surface for observation.
Pictures were also used to inspect lunar rocks, surface, and
subsurface soil at close range and the local terrain out to the
horizon. Two Surveyors landed in lunar craters, two in level mare
terrain, and one in hilly highlands. In addition to lunar scenes, the
spacecraft obtained a number of Earth, Sun and sky images.
The practical mission objective of checking typical Apollo
landing sites in the equatorial band was achieved by the first four
operating landers, and, coupled with Surveyor VII, which was directed
to a much different region, the Surveyors compiled an unparallelled
data base on the nature of the lunar surface.
In November 1969, Apollo 12 landed within sight of Surveyor III
in Oceanus Procellarum and Astronauts Alan Bean and Pete Conrad walked
over to the 2-1/2-year-old lunar visitor, inspected it, and removed
the camera and other parts and returned them to Earth for study.
During Surveyor's pre-launch development phase, the Project
carried out design studies for a follow-on mission using a small lunar
roving vehicle carried aboard the main Surveyor spacecraft. These
missions were never scheduled or developed, but two mechanical
prototype rovers were built, a four-tracked vehicle and a six-wheeler
with a three-segment, jointed body.
The six-wheeled lunar rover completed a series of remote- control
mobility tests, climbing down from a Surveyor frame and maneuvering
around and over rocks. It survived for more than twenty years in a
series of technology programs, helping JPL engineers formulate and study
robot-rover mobility, control, and navigation concepts and software.
Thus Surveyor's data, some of its lunar flight hardware, and its
follow-on mission studies remain a living heritage in today's
planetary science and exploration technology.
#####
SURVEYOR FLIGHT AND LUNAR-SURFACE OPERATIONS
Mission Launch Land Pictures Last Signal (L.D.)
I 5/30/66 6/2/66 11,240 1/7/67 (8)
II 9/20/66 -- -- 9/22/66 --
III 4/17/67 4/20/67 6,326 5/4/67 (1)
IV 7/14/67 -- -- 7/18/67 --
V 9/8/67 9/11/67 19,118 12/17/67 (4)
VI 11/7/67 11/10/67 29,952 12/14/67 (2)
VII 1/7/68 1/10/68 21,038 2/21/68 (2)
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Pound for pound,
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | grasshoppers are 3 times as
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | nutritious as beef.
|
| 550.41 | Lecture on planetary exploration | VERGA::KLAES | All the Universe, or nothing! | Mon Nov 16 1992 18:44 | 90 |
| From: DECWRL::"[email protected]" "MAIL-11 Daemon" 16-NOV-1992
13:48:01.25
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Future of Planetary Exploration Lecture
This came in a flyer from the Planetary Society, and I thought it
would be of interest to everyone here.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thirty years ago this month, humanity witnessed its first planetary
encounter when Mariner 2 flew by Venus and demonstrated that the planet
is astonishingly hot. On December 8, 1992, we will celebrate our newest
encounter when Galileo swings past Earth one last time on its voyage to
Jupiter...
The Planetary Society
in cooperation with
NASA, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and
the California Institute of of Technology
presents
THE FUTURE OF PLANETARY EXPLORATION:
A DIALOGUE
Daniel Goldin & Carl Sagan
Introduction by Edward Stone
Friday, December 4, 1992
8:00 pm
Bechman Auditorium
California Institute of Technology
Michigan Avenue (sout of Del Mar)
Pasadena, California
Information: (800) 423-8849 or (818) 356-4652
Admission: $10.00
On December 14, 1962, Earth's first successful planetary probe,
Mariner 2, entered space exploration history when it gathered
important scientific data on it flight past Venus. 30 years later
Earth itself will be visited by a planetary spacecraft when Galileo
flies past Earth for the second and last time. Using three planetary
fly-bys (two with Earth, one with Venus) as gravity assists, Galileo
will have finally gathered enough speed for the last leg of its
journey to a rendezvous with Jupiter and its moons in 1995.
In celebration, the Planetary Society will sponsor a very special
event on December 4, 1992 as a prelude to the encounter. NASA
Administrator Daniel Goldin and Planetary Society President Carl Sagan
will meet one-on-one in a public forum to discuss the future of
planetary exploration, both here in the United States and with
international partners. Their dialogue will be followed by a question
and answer session to allow audience participation.
Edward Stone, Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, will
begin the evening with an update on Galileo's progress and a tribute
to Mariner 2.
Doors open at 7:30 PM. Free parking on Caltech campus.
Tickets may be ordered by mail or phone. To order by mail,
please enclose a self-addressed, stamped envelope for return of your
tickets. Orders received within seven (7) days of the event will be
help up for pick-up at the door of the Auditorium, beginning one hour
before performance time. Mail or fax your order to: Ticket Office,
Caltech 332-92, Pasadena, CA 91125; fax (818) 577-0130. Or charge by
phone (800) 423-8849 or (818) 356-4652. Charge to your VISA,
MASTERCARD, AMERICAN EXPRESS or DISCOVER CARD ($3 per order phone
service charge).
Name:
Address:
City: State: Zip: Phone (day):
Method of Payment: Check (made payable to CALTECH):
VISA, MC, AMEX, DISCOVER
Card No: Expiration Date:
Signature as name appears on card:
Number of General Admission tickets desired @ $10.00 each: Total:
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Learn to recognize the
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | inconsequential, then
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | ignore it.
|
| 550.42 | Silver anniversary of SURVEYOR 7 lunar mission | VERGA::KLAES | I, Robot | Mon Jan 11 1993 16:19 | 198 |
| Article: 30499
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary,comp.robotics,sci.geo.geology
Subject: Surveyor 7 - 25 Years Ago
Date: 11 Jan 1993 17:27 UT
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
This is in honor of Surveyor 7, which was launched and landed
on the Moon 25 years ago.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
OFFICE OF PUBLIC INFORMATION
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY, CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA. TELEPHONE 354-5011
Sunday, December 31, 1967
SURVEYOR VII TO COMBINE DIGGING, CHEMICAL TESTING
OF SURFACE OF MOON'S HIGHLANDS
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA--Surveyor VII will both dig and
analyze the Moon's surface if all goes well next month in the
last and probably most difficult of the United States' series
of lunar surface probes.
This Surveyor is scheduled to land in the rough south-
west highlands, 18 miles north of Tycho Crater. The four suc-
cessful Surveyors all have descended in the relatively smooth
equatorial belt designated likely for later Apollo astronaut
landings.
Scientific investigators of the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration and Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
hope to satisfy their curiosity about this more formidable area
of the Moon and add to the increasing knowledge of the composi-
tion of the Moon's soil.
Scientific investigators of the National Aeronautics
and Space Administrations and Caltech's Jet Propulsion Labora-
tory hope to satisfy their curiosity about this more formidable
area of the Moon and add to the increasing knowledge of the
composition of the Moon's soil.
Surveyor III last April utilized a claw-type digger to
probe the hardness of the lunar surface. Dr. Ronald F. Scott,
Caltech civil engineering professor and experimenter on the
sampling device, said the digging showed the surface material
was granular and slightly cohesive, not unlike some Earth soil.
The ASI readings from Surveyors V and VI indicate that
the lunar material analyzed is similar to terrestrial basalts
and basaltic achrondite, Dr. Anthony L. Turkevich, University of
Chicago, principal chemical investigator, reports. The ASI gold
box enables scientists to correlate Moon components with the
chemical elements as well as Earth and meteoritic rock types.
Basaltic achrondites form a small percentage of all
meteorites that have been found on Earth. It seems possible to
scientists that they could be fragments of lunar rock, ejected
by the impact of a meteorites on the Moon, Dr. Scott says.
Surveyor's digger, or surface sampler, operated by
Floyd Robertson, JPL engineer, and Dr. Scott, will scoop up
soil from below the Moon's surface and spread it for the ASI to
analyze. The plan calls for the claw to dig as deeply as possible--
18 inches is the maximum--as well as scrape surface material.
The claw, on the end of a five-foot aluminum flexing
arm, also will be capable of picking up the analyzer box and
putting it down on excavated dirt anywhere within an area of a
few square feet. On signal from JPL's Goldstone Station, the
claw will grasp a small knob above the box. The box is attached
to the spacecraft by a nylon cord.
The digger arm can be swung out in a 112-degree sweep,
nearly one-third of a circle. It can be lifted as high as 40
inches, and dropped to break up clods or rocks. The falling
scoop can exert a pressure of three pounds per square inch.
Surveyor III tests, however, found lunar rocks that withstood
up to several hundred pounds per square inch when squeezed by
the door of the motor-driven digger.
Dr. Scott's conclusion about the surface where Surveyor
III landed was that it was mostly fine-grained, slightly cohe-
sive soil much like damp sand found on Earth, with some increase
in firmness and density with depth. However, Surveyor III's
digger got down only seven inches.
By digging deeper trenches, Dr. Scott believes it will
be possible to obtain more data on the bearing strength of the
lunar soil. This is done by computing the difference in
electrical motor current required to move the scoop in various
phases of the digging.
The bearing strength of the Moon in the four Apollo
belt areas has been measured at 3 to 8 pounds per square inch
at a depth of one to two inches. It is suspected to be stronger
further down. At any rate, NASA and JPL scientists now feel
there is no need to worry about the ability of any of the four
sites tested thus far to support astronauts.
The digger's five-inch claw will have two small
U-shaped magnets at its base. With the aid of the television
camera aboard, investigators will see whether anything sticks
to the magnets. Previous Surveyor magnet tests indicate only
about 1/4 of one per cent of the Apollo belt soil is magnetic,
perhaps meteoritic iron.
The January mission is the most sophisticated in the
Surveyor series. The camera, digger and ASI all are operated
via the same radio channel, hence they cannot be commanded
simultaneously. Any station in the JPL Deep Space Network can
give command signals to the camera and the ASI, but only
Goldstone will control the digger. This limits its operation to
about five hours daily, with a like period allowed for taking
pictures of the excavating.
The first post-landing day will be occupied with photo-
surveying the landing area near Tycho and warming up the alpha
scattering box for its first 20-hour analysis. The digger will
be deployed on the second day and start scraping and scooping.
With luck, the scientists hope to make at least two
thorough analyses of moon soil--at the surface and in depth--in
the first two weeks after the arrival of Surveyor VII.
----------------------------------------------------------------
From the "Solar System Log"
Surveyor 7
Launched: 0630 GMT, January 7, 1968
Vehicle: Atlas-Centaur 15 (Atlas No 5903C)
Site: ETR 36A
Spacecraft Mass: 1040kg at launch, 306kg on landing
Destination: Moon
Mission: Soft Landing
Arrival: Landed 010536 GMT, January 10, 1968, at 40.86 degrees S/47 degrees W.
Payload: TV Camera + stereo mirrors
Alpha-scattering instrument
Surface sampler
Footpad magnet
End of Mission: February 21, 1968 (last contact 0024 GMT)
Notes: Seventh successful lunar lander (fifth U.S.)
The four successful Surveyors satisfied Apollo requirements in
the Moon's equatorial zone, allowing Surveyor 7 to be released for a
scientific mission. The ejecta blanket emanating from the bright,
fresh ray crater Tycho on the far south was chosen, the rough highland
region dictating a target area only 20 km in diameter instead of the
60 km of the earlier missions. For this reason, two course corrections
were planned, but the first was so accurate - leaving Surveyor 7 only
2.5 km off target - that no further alteration was necessary.
The three-legged vehicle touched at 3.8m/sec some 29 km north of
Tycho's rim after a 66 hour 35 minute flight. The cameras revealed a
rough area covered in blocks but, surprisingly, with fewer crater than
the mare sites; there was a gentle slope of 3 degrees. No other
spacecraft has landed further from the equator, a planned late Apollo
mission to Tycho never materializing.
After 20.9 hours on the surface, a pyrotechnic squib was fired on
command from Earth to drop the alpha-scattering instrument to the
surface, but the spectrometer stayed put. This was fortuitously the
first flight with both a sample arm and a spectrometer, and the scoop
was used to force the recalcitrant device to the ground. That arm
later picked it up to analyze a rock and then the soil in a 1 cm deep
trench, accumulating 63 hours of data during the first lunar day. The
main finding was a lower iron content than at the mare sites.
The scoop was used in 16 surface bearing-strength tests, dug
seven trenches - one 40 cm long and 15 cm deep - and turned over a
rock. One rock sample was "weighed" by lifting it and recording the
required motor current; a value of 2.4-3.1 g/cc was obtained. One
rock was fractured, and on several occasions material stuck to the
two magnets mounted on the scoop.
Some 20,993 pictures were recorded during the first lunar day
and observations continued for 15 hours after sunset at 0606 GMT
on January 25. Image of the Earth and the Sun's corona out to
50 solar radii were obtained. Stereo imaging of small areas
was possible by using a 9x24 cm mirror mounted on the antenna mast,
and on January 20 the TV had registered two 1 W lasers aimed at the
lander from observatories in California and Arizona. This demonstrated
the feasibility of using lasers for communications and measuring the
Earth-Moon distance with great accuracy (this was done later with
laser reflectors left by Apollo and Lunokhod).
Surveyor 7 was reactivated at 1901 on February 12, 1968, but
the long, cold lunar night had taken its toll and only another 45
200-line pictures were returned before it succumbed on February 21.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Choose a job you love, and
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | you'll never have to work
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | a day in your life.
|
| 550.43 | JPL Year in Review - 1992 | VERGA::KLAES | I, Robot | Wed Jan 20 1993 16:43 | 267 |
| Article: 30817
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary
Subject: 1992 - A Year To Remember
Date: 20 Jan 93 01:49:55 GMT
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
From the "JPL Universe"
January 15, 1993
1992 was a year to remember for JPL
By Mark Whalen
1992 may have been the busiest and most satisfying year in
JPL's history. As deep-space missions were launched from Earth,
others continued forward toward their goals after leaving our
planet in earlier years. The Lab's technological, engineering and
scientific wizardry allowed us to gaze at passing asteroids and
far off galaxies alike, and excited us with close-up views of our
own planet and others.
New and challenging missions were proposed, helping us look
toward the next century with excitement and anticipation. And
1992 also showed the great diversity that is JPL, as much of the
Lab's efforts and discoveries attest to the fact that Earth is
indeed the most important planet for us to observe from above.
Some highlights:
January
Magellan, which was launched in May 1989, began its third
mapping cycle of Venus and focused on stereo mapping of selected
targets and areas not mapped earlier. ... A nine-member
delegation of Russian scientists and engineers spent a week at
the Lab, meeting with staff members of JPL's Navigation Ancillary
Information Facility to study a NASA information system they are
adopting for data distribution during their mission to Mars in
1994. They also met with scientists and engineers from the Mars
Observer mission and the Space Flight Operations Center.
February
Spaceborne radar and enhanced satellite images helped JPL
geologists locate the lost city of Ubar in southern Oman, a
civilization dating back 5,000 years. ... On its way to the poles
of the sun, the Ulysses spacecraft sailed past Jupiter at closest
approach of about 172,000 kilometers (277,474 miles) from the
planet's center on Feb. 8. The spacecraft found a magnetosphere
that is more extended and thinner than that encountered by
Voyager. The Ulysses project also announced that the spacecraft
was able to study charged particles around Jupiter at higher
latitudes than its predecessors. ... JPL's Microwave Limb Sounder
(MLS) team announced discovery of exceptionally high levels of
ozone-destroying chlorine monoxide at Earth's northern latitudes.
MLS is aboard NASA's Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS).
"The findings show that the ozone layer is in significantly more
danger than previously thought," said Dr. Joe Waters, MLS' team
leader. ... The All Source Analysis System (ASAS), a computerized
battlefield intelligence system developed by JPL for the Army
which saw limited action in the Persian Gulf war, was accredited
by the Defense Intelligence Agency, meaning that ASAS can now be
deployed for use on battlefields as the Army chooses. ... JPL
Director Dr. Edward Stone announced Lab-wide implementation of
the Total Quality Management (TQM) initiative, focusing on customer
satisfaction and continuous improvement of work processes.
March
The Mars Observer spacecraft passed its last major test
before shipment to Cape Canaveral -- a 12-day thermal
environmental test to simulate the vacuum and temperature of
space. ... A new business ethics program is launched at the Lab.
April
Andrew Thomas, a JPL mechanical engineer, was chosen as an
astronaut for NASA's space shuttle program. ... JPL's Employee
Recreation Club celebrated its 40-year anniversary. ...
Organizational Dynamics Inc., JPL's TQM consultant, found in a
random Lab survey that employees believe that existing policies
and procedures "interfere with their ability to perform excellent
work." The survey also found that employees believe that "many
policies and practices are outdated and get in the way of serving
customers." ... JPL and the Pasadena Unified School District
dedicated the district's new Saturday Science Academy program,
which was partially funded through a $50,000 contribution from JPL.
May
Oceanographer Mark Drinkwater, JPL's principal investigator
for the Weddell Sea Project, began research in the Antarctic on
that region's interaction of the ocean, ice cover and atmosphere.
... Newly appointed NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin made his
first visit to JPL on May 28, urging Lab employees to be bold and
innovative, and to try to cut through NASA's bureaucracy to
restore the agency's technical and managerial excellence. ... JPL
Director Dr. Edward Stone told the first-ever "Briefing for
Industry" conference in Pasadena that the Lab wants to build a
stronger relationship with industry. "We see industry more in
partnership. But this also means that industry should assign its
very best people to projects and provide sufficient
oversight. ...Magellan project scientists identified large
landslides on Venus which are similar to slides on Earth and
Mars, the largest of which spread 30 km (18 miles) across the
surface. Project Scientist Steve Saunders said the most dramatic
landslides on Venus may have formed much like the Mount St.
Helens eruption in Washington in 1980. ... NASA approved JPL's
redesign of the Cassini mission to Saturn, set for 1997. Under
the plan, the spacecraft's weight will be cut by about 20 percent
to 5,050 kilograms (11,130 pounds); overall cost is projected to
drop by about $250 million.
June
The Galileo mission released detailed photographs of the
asteroid Gaspra, which were taken in October 1991. The spacecraft
visited Gaspra on its first swing through the main asteroid belt,
between gravity-assist flyby encounters with Earth. Images were
played back indirectly from the spacecraft tape recorder through
the low-gain antenna at distances of up to 430 million kilometers
(266 million miles). ... In commemoration of the 25th anniversary
of the Surveyor rover missions to the moon, JPL revealed "Rocky
IV," a prototype for a small rover that will be part of the Mars
Environmental Survey (MESUR) Pathfinder mission, which would send
a single lander and instrumented rover to Mars beforehand to
photograph the surface and look for hydrogen, a possible sign of
water. The remote-controlled, 16 1/2-pound vehicle is designed as
a precursor to a sample-return mission. ... Citing the fact that
"A classic never goes out of style," Goldin announced that the
agency's original 1959 "meatball" insignia would return to
replace the newer, tubular "worm" logo. ... JPL research
physicist Eugene Trinh served as a payload specialist on STS-50
(Space Shuttle Columbia), the U.S. Microgravity Laboratory-1.
During the 14-day mission, the longest ever for shuttle flights,
Trinh conducted experiments on the Drop Physics Module, a
microgravity instrument supporting various experiments on the
dynamics of fluids and gases in space.
July
Dr. Peter Lyman, Deputy Director of the Lab for five years,
announced his retirement; Larry Dumas, formerly assistant
laboratory director for the Office of Telecommunications and Data
Acquisition, was named Deputy Director.
August
TOPEX/Poseidon, a joint U.S./French mission managed by JPL
to study ocean surfaces in unprecedented detail, took off from
Kourou, French Guiana on Aug. 10. The three-to-five-year mission,
which will utilize a dual-frequency radar altimeter and high-
accuracy satellite orbit determination systems, will enable
oceanographers to map the large-scale movement of ocean water and
understand how the ocean changes with time. The satellite's orbit
will take it over the entire Earth's surface every 10 days. ...
The Deep Space Network successfully tracked the European
spacecraft Giotto as it flew within 200 kilometers (124 miles) of
the comet Grigg-Skjellerup, the closest encounter ever performed
by a spacecraft. ... Robert Staehle of JPL's Systems Analysis
Section described the feasibility of a fast flyby mission to
Pluto, which could be launched before the end of the decade. ...
Launch of the Mars Observer spacecraft was delayed
because of contamination in the nose fairing, discovered
during a routine payload inspection. ... Norman Haynes, who had
served as deputy assistant laboratory director for the Flight
Projects Office, was named to replace Dumas as ALD for the Office
of Telecommunications and Data Acquisition. ... The U.S. Postal
Service issued a commemorative stamp honoring JPL founder Dr.
Theodore von Karman.
September
Ulysses Project Scientist Edward Smith reported that data
acquired by the spacecraft show that the solar wind exerts a much
stronger influence on Jupiter's magnetic field than previously
thought. ... The Mars Observer spacecraft lifted off on Sept. 25.
The mission, which will play a critical pathfinding role for
future missions to Mars, will study the planet's geology,
geophysics and climate. Objectives include identifying and
mapping surface elements and minerals, measuring the height of
surface features, defining the gravitational field and searching
for a planetary magnetic field. The spacecraft will reach Mars in
August 1993 and will spend a full Martian year -- 687 days --
mapping the planet.
October
Space Shuttle Columbia carried in its cargo bay JPL's Lambda
Point Experiment, which used cryogenics technology developed by
the Lab's Low Temperature Research facility to study changes in
properties of materials during phase transitions. The environment
of space allowed testing of a Nobel Prize-winning physics theory
to an accuracy 100 times greater than that possible on Earth. ...
Five hundred years after Columbus landed in America, JPL's High
Resolution Microwave Survey -- the most powerful search ever for
extraterrestrial intelligence -- began its sky survey at the Deep
Space Network's Goldstone station, NASA's Ames Research Center
and at the Aricebo Radio Observatory in Puerto Rico. DSN antennas
in California and Australia will scan the entire sky across
millions of frequencies in the microwave band. ... JPL
geologists, working with colleagues from Louisiana State
University, discovered previously unknown earthquake faults in
the Mojave Desert by analyzing remote sensing images at optical,
infrared and radar wavelengths. ... The SIR-C/X-SAR Project
received delivery of the X-band hardware from its German and
Italian manufacturers, making way for testing and integration in
1993. When completed, the antenna -- which will perform a series
of environmental experiments from Space Shuttle Endeavour -- will
be the most massive piece of flight hardware ever assembled at JPL.
November
JPL astronomer Peter Eisenhardt reported findings that a
distant radio galaxy previously thought to contain old stars --
older than some estimates of the age of the universe -- may
instead be a very young system caught in the act of formation.
... The Lab announced it has entered into a collaboration with
Cray Research Inc. to conduct joint research and development with
a new massively parallel supercomputer developed by Cray. JPL
will take delivery of one of the first models this fall. ... The
Miniature Seeker Technology Integration (MSTI) spacecraft took
off from Vandenberg Air Force Base on a four-day mission. MSTI,
which carried a Department of Defense payload that took infrared
photos of islands in the Pacific Ocean, undertook an innovative
approach in its design process which was hardware-driven, rather
than requirements-driven. Eighty-three percent of the $15-million
spacecraft was built from off-the-shelf components. ... The
"eyes" of the Hubble Space Telescope -- JPL's Wide
Field/Planetary Camera-1, captured the most detailed view ever of
a galaxy's core, feeding a suspected black hole in the Virgo
cluster, about 45 million light years from Earth. Final work is
under way on WF/PC-2, which will correct the optical flaw in
Hubble's primary mirror in late 1993.
December
Exactly two years after its first gravity assist pass by
Earth, the Galileo spacecraft made its second flyby on its way to
Jupiter on Dec. 8, streaking above the South Atlantic Ocean at an
altitude of 304 kilometers (189 miles). On its way to Earth, the
spacecraft's camera captured various images and spectral scans of
the northern regions of the moon, as it flew within 110,000
kilometers (about 68,000 miles) of the lunar surface. The
spacecraft will reach Jupiter in December 1995. ... One day after
Galileo's closest approach to Earth, researchers for the Galileo
Optical Experiment (GOPEX) fired laser beams from locations in
California and New Mexico to the spacecraft at distances of up to
6 million kilometers (3.7 million miles). GOPEX is part of a
program testing the use of laser beams to transmit large volumes
of space-acquired data currently achieved by radio signals. ...
Using satellite images taken before and after the June Landers
earthquake, JPL geologist Robert Crippen produced a videotape
showing the motion of earthquake faults in the Mojave Desert.
This was the first time that fault motion has been observed
through the use of images acquired from space. ... JPL
astronomers obtained the sharpest images yet of an Earth-
approaching asteroid, 4179 Toutatis, as it passed within 4
million kilometers (2.5 million miles) of Earth.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Every once in a while,
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | try pushing your luck.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.44 | Planetary Missions Update -- 01/27/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon Feb 01 1993 11:25 | 88 |
| Article 2976 of sci.space.news:
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Path: nntpd2.cxo.dec.com!nntpd.lkg.dec.com!news.crl.dec.com!deccrl!caen!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!spool.mu.edu!agate!ames!dont-send-mail-to-path-lines
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: JPL Mission Updates - 01/27/93
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Followup-To: sci.space
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41
Keywords: JPL
Sender: [email protected]
Nntp-Posting-Host: kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Sun, 31 Jan 1993 00:40:00 GMT
Approved: [email protected]
Lines: 69
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
January 27, 1993
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft continue their
interstellar mission with fields-and-particles data acquisition.
Voyager 1 was launched September 5, 1977, is currently 7.6
billion kilometers (4.7 billion miles) from the Sun after flying
by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980; Voyager 2 was launched
August 20, 1977, flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus
(1986), and Neptune (1989), is now 5.8 billion kilometers (3.6
billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft is continuing its survey of the
gravitational field of Venus, utilizing precise navigation of the
spacecraft in the near-Venus portion of its orbit through May 15,
1992. Magellan was launched May 4, 1989, aboard Space Shuttle
Atlantis with an IUS injection stage.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
go into orbit there on December 7, 1995. It completed its second
Earth gravity assist on December 8, picking up the last increment
of velocity for the Jupiter flight. Spacecraft performance and
condition are excellent except that the high-gain antenna is only
partly deployed; science and engineering data are being
transmitted via the low-gain antenna. An operation intended to
free the high-gain antenna by pulsing the antenna-deployment
motors began in late December and concluded January 19 without
success. The Project will now focus on completing the Jupiter
mission using the low-gain antenna. Galileo was launched October
18, 1989, by Space Shuttle Atlantis and an IUS, and flew by Venus
and Earth in 1990 for earlier gravity assists.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
almost 17 degrees south of the ecliptic plane, in transit from
its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar
polar passages in 1994 and 1995. Its condition and performance
are excellent, and it continues to observe the interplanetary
medium. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space
Agency and launched October 6, 1990 aboard Space Shuttle
Discovery, with IUS and PAM-S stages.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/Poseidon: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. To date, eleven 10-day science-data cycles
have been collected for processing and verification as planned.
TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992, aboard Ariane 52.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal, and
Mars Observer is on its planned trajectory leading to Mars orbit
insertion August 24, 1993. It is now in the "outer cruise"
flight mode, with communications on the high-gain antenna. The
scientific instruments are being checked out on schedule. The
second TCM is planned for February 8. Mars Observer was launched
aboard a Titan III/TOS vehicle on September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Every once in a while,
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | try pushing your luck.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.45 | Mission to Mercury - HERMES | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Sun Feb 28 1993 16:57 | 159 |
| From: DECWRL::"[email protected]" "Ron Baalke" 26-FEB-1993
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Proposed Mercury Mission
From the "JPL Universe"
February 26, 1993
New way of doing business encourages Mercury team
By Mark Whalen
It's becoming clear that the catchphrase "faster, better,
cheaper" is more than just a slogan at JPL. It is, indeed, a new
way of doing business, a new philosophy that has now paid off for
a small but ambitious JPL-led team working on a proposed mission
to Mercury.
The 20-member team -- headed by Principal Investigator
Robert M. Nelson of JPL's Geology and Planetology Section 326 and
11 other Lab staff members -- combines science, engineering and
management disciplines to form the backbone of the Hermes Global
Orbiter mission concept, which was selected by NASA earlier this
month as one of 11 new projects in the agency's Discovery Program
to be funded for additional study.
Nelson said Hermes was the only JPL project selected (with a
Lab scientist as principal investigator) out of 13 submitted. Lab
staffers are serving as co-investigators on some of the other 10
named by NASA.
The Hermes mission and the other 10 Discovery class missions
each received $100,000 to support further development and to
"encourage further work," according to Nelson, who added, "It's a
morale booster" that NASA headquarters considered the project
worthy of further investigation.
The 11 potential projects were selected out of an original
roster of 73 submitted to NASA at a workshop held at the San Juan
Capistrano Research Institute last November. Those selected were
those considered to have the highest scientific value as well as
a reasonable chance of meeting strict budgetary guidelines of no
more than $150 million.
Nelson said the proposed mission -- with a targeted launch
date of September 2002 -- calls for a single spacecraft launched
by a Delta II rocket to be placed in an elliptical orbit around
Mercury for one Earth year (four Mercury years) after orbital
insertion. With two gravity assists each from Venus and Mercury
to minimize propulsion requirements, the spacecraft would begin
orbiting Mercury in August 2005.
The mission's goals are to understand Mercury's surface and
interior structure. It would serve as a long-awaited follow-up to
the Mariner 10 flyby mission in 1974, when only half of the
planet was observed.
"Hermes' first objective," said Nelson, "is to survey and
map the half of Mercury that has never been seen, and then to
determine the surface composition."
Team member Rosaly Lopes-Gautier, a planetologist in the
Atmospheric and Cometary Sciences Section 324, underscored the
importance of Hermes' proposed objectives by drawing comparisons
to the results from early Mars missions, when "people talked of a
very cratered, moon-like planet. Then when Mariner 9 came along
and mapped the whole planet, it showed that (Mars') northern
hemisphere was totally different. It proved that just because you
have seen half of a planet, you can't assume you can extend your
knowledge to the other half.
"There could be some considerable surprises on the other
side of Mercury," she said.
Team member Linda Horn, a planetary scientist in Section
326, added that there are additional incentives to continue study
of the closest planet to the sun. "Radar measurements from Earth
have shown bright regions at Mercury's poles," she said, "and it
has been suggested that there might be ice deep in the planet's
polar craters, where sunlight doesn't hit."
Because Mercury is so close to the sun -- an average
distance of 58 million kilometers (about 36 million miles) away
-- protecting the spacecraft's instruments will pose a major
challenge. Plans call for shading devices, insulation and
thermal inertia to protect the spacecraft when the solar
radiation and the thermal flux from Mercury are most difficult to
manage. The mission's payload contains an optical observation
facility, an ultraviolet spectrometer and a magnetometer.
The mission utilizes a "clever orbital design," said Nelson.
"It will have a highly elliptical orbit, spending a short amount
of time close to Mercury. The spacecraft will take a lot of
science information while it is close to Mercury (and warming
up), and then it will go a great distance away from the planet
and spend long periods of time cooling off and sending back the data."
The Hermes spacecraft is one "that has flown many times
before," said Nelson, "but it will be modified to accommodate
Mercury's environment. We will do some instrument modification
also, but that will be done fairly early. In some cases we're
taking instruments that have flown before and making copies of them.
"Those are the principal ways we're going to perform the
mission cheaper than in the past," he added.
The organization of the Hermes team may be the most
interesting facet of the proposed mission. "Most of the time,"
said Nelson, "scientists don't have a major role in mission
development, spacecraft design, ground systems design and
operations planning -- all those things you need to do to fly a
spacecraft.
"From the start," he added, "we had engineers saying to
scientists, `you just can't do that observation with the
spacecraft and instruments we've got available. Let's think of
another way. '"
Team member Adriana Ocampo, a planetary geologist in Section
324, said, "I think our team is comprised of `Renaissance-type'
people. We have a lot of different talents, and most of the team
not only has had first hand experience working with flight
projects, but they're scientists who understand the engineering
aspects of a mission."
"There are a lot of advantages to having a small team,"
added Lopes-Gautier. "People are much more willing to work
together and chip in to do whatever needs to be done, rather than
say, `I'm a scientist; I'm not going to get involved in the
engineering aspects,' or vice versa. This can happen on the
bigger missions."
In addition, six of the 20 team members are women, "an
extraordinarily high percentage," noted Ocampo.
"We picked who we thought were the best people, and with the
number of women professionals in physical science at 7 percent, I
was really pleased that this many women were selected," said Nelson.
The next step for the Hermes team will come sometime next
year, when NASA conducts a more formal process to determine final
selection of missions to be conducted.
The other Hermes team members from JPL are San-San Kuo,
Section 326; Arthur Lane, Section 732; Ken Manatt, Section 326;
Ray Morris, Section 317; William Smythe, Section 324; Brad
Wallis, Section 326; James Weiss, Section 326; and Chen Wan Yen,
Section 312.
###
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | If you don't stand for
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | something, you'll fall
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | for anything.
% ====== Internet headers and postmarks (see DECWRL::GATEWAY.DOC) ======
% From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
% Subject: Proposed Mercury Mission
|
| 550.46 | Planetary Missions Status -- 02/26/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon Mar 01 1993 10:18 | 88 |
| Article 3140 of sci.space.news:
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Path: nntpd2.cxo.dec.com!nntpd.lkg.dec.com!news.crl.dec.com!deccrl!caen!saimiri.primate.wisc.edu!ames!dont-send-mail-to-path-lines
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: JPL Mission Updates - 02/26/93
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Followup-To: sci.space
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41
Keywords: JPL
Sender: [email protected]
Nntp-Posting-Host: kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1993 18:18:00 GMT
Approved: [email protected]
Lines: 69
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
February 26, 1993
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft continue their
interstellar mission with fields-and-particles data acquisition.
Voyager 1 was launched September 5, 1977, is currently 7.7
billion kilometers (4.8 billion miles) from the Sun after flying
by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980; Voyager 2 was launched
August 20, 1977, flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus
(1986), and Neptune (1989), is now 5.9 billion kilometers (3.7
billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft is continuing its survey of the
gravitational field of Venus, utilizing precise navigation of the
spacecraft in the near-Venus portion of its orbit through May 15,
1993. Magellan was launched May 4, 1989, aboard Space Shuttle
Atlantis with an IUS injection stage; it radar-mapped more than
99% of Venus's surface from September 1990 to September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
go into orbit there on December 7, 1995. Spacecraft performance
and condition are excellent except that the high-gain antenna is
only partly deployed; science and engineering data are being
transmitted via the low-gain antenna. The Project is now
planning the Jupiter mission and the August 1993 encounter with
asteroid Ida assuming dependence on the low-gain antenna.
Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, by Space Shuttle Atlantis
and an IUS, and flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992
for gravity assists and asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 for
scientific observation.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
about 18 degrees south of the ecliptic plane, in transit from its
Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar polar
passages in 1994 and 1995. On February 14, 1993, Ulysses put
itself in the safe mode for unknown reasons, but normal operating
condition and performance, including cruise science, were
restored within three days. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by
the European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990 aboard
Space Shuttle Discovery, with IUS and PAM-S stages.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/Poseidon: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. Initial results from the mission to map ocean
circulation are being presented at a press conference February
26. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992, aboard Ariane 52.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal, and
Mars Observer is on its planned trajectory leading to Mars orbit
insertion August 24, 1993. It completed its second trajectory
correction maneuver of about 9.6 meters per second on February
10. It is now in the "outer cruise" flight mode, communicating
via the high-gain antenna. Mars Observer was launched aboard a
Titan III/TOS vehicle on September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | If you don't stand for
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | something, you'll fall
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | for anything.
|
| 550.47 | Proposed mission to the planets | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Thu Mar 04 1993 11:44 | 201 |
| From: DECWRL::"[email protected]" "Ron Baalke" 12-FEB-1993
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Discovery Missions Selected for Further Study
Donald L. Savage
Headquarters, Washington, D.C. February 11, 1993
(Phone: 202/358-1727)
RELEASE: 93-027
NASA SELECTS 11 DISCOVERY MISSION CONCEPTS FOR STUDY
NASA today announced the selection of 11 new science mission
concepts in the Discovery Program which have been identified for
further study during this fiscal year.
The mission candidates were selected from 73 concepts
discussed at the Discovery Mission Workshop held at the San Juan
Capistrano Research Institute in San Juan Capistrano, Calif.,
last Nov. 16-20. The potential projects were those considered to
have the highest scientific value as well as a reasonable chance
of meeting strict budgetary guidelines.
Discovery missions are designed to proceed from development
to flight in less than 3 years, combining well-defined
objectives, proven instruments and flight systems, costs limited
to no more than $150 million and acceptance of a greater level of
risk.
"These missions represent a bold new way of doing business
at NASA," said NASA Administrator Dan Goldin. "By accepting a
greater level of risk, we can deliver high-return missions that
are cost-effective, quicker from concept to launch, and
responsive to the present budget climate. They promise to
revolutionize the way we carry out planetary science in the next
century."
"The Discovery Program is probably the most exciting new
initiative in planetary exploration," said Dr. Wesley T.
Huntress, Jr., Director of NASA's Solar System Exploration
Division.
"We now will be able to more effectively take advantage of
emerging technology and quickly - and relatively cheaply -
undertake more new missions of discovery than at anytime since
the beginning of the space age. Also, because of the shorter
time frames and lower costs, these missions will allow greater
participation from the academic and aerospace communities,"
Huntress said.
The 11 mission concepts to be studied are:
% Mercury Polar Flyby has an objective to study the
polar caps and complete the photographic reconnaissance of the planet.
Principal Investigator: Paul D. Spudis, Lunar and Planetary
Institute, Houston.
% Hermes Global Orbiter to Mercury involves remote
sensing of the planet's surface, atmosphere and magnetosphere.
Principal Investigator: Robert Nelson, Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
% Venus Multiprobe Mission involves placement of 14
small entry probes over one hemisphere of Venus to measure winds,
temperature and pressure. Principal Investigator: Richard
Goody, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.
% Venus Composition Probe enters Venus' atmosphere in
daylight to measure atmospheric structure and composition on a
parachute descent. Principal Investigator: Larry W. Esposito,
University of Colorado, Boulder.
% Cometary Coma Chemical Composition aims to rendezvous
with a cometary nucleus at or near perihelion and conduct 100
days of scientific operations. Principal Investigator: Glenn C.
Carle, NASA Ames Research Center, Mountain View, Calif.
% Mars Upper Atmosphere Dynamics, Energetics and
Evolution Mission will study Mars' upper atmosphere and
ionosphere. Principal Investigator: Timothy Killeen, University
of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
% Comet Nucleus Tour involves study of three comets
during a 5-year mission, focusing on structure and composition of
the nucleus. Principal Investigator: Joseph Veverka, Cornell
University, Ithica, N.Y.
% Small Missions to Asteroids and Comets involves four
separate spacecraft launches to study distinctly different types
of comets and asteroids. Principal Investigator: Michael
Belton, National Optical Astronomy Observatories, Tuscon, Ariz.
% Near Earth Asteroid Returned Sample will acquire
samples from six sites on a near-Earth asteroid and return them
to Earth for study. Principal Investigator: Eugene Shoemaker,
U.S. Geological Survey, Flagstaff, Ariz.
% Earth Orbital Ultraviolet Jovian Observer will study
the Jovian system from Earth orbit with a spectroscopic imaging
telescope. Principal Investigator: Paul Feldman, Johns Hopkins
University, Baltimore.
% Solar Wind Sample Return mission aims at collecting
and returning solar wind material to Earth for analysis.
Principal Investigator: Don Burnett, Calif. Institute of
Technology, Pasadena.
In addition, three concepts also were targeted for further
consideration this fiscal year. They are:
% Mainbelt Asteroid Rendezvous Explorer would
rendezvous and orbit the mainbelt asteroids Iris or Vesta.
Principal Investigator: Joseph Veverka, Cornell University,
Ithica, N.Y.
% Comet Nucleus Penetrator would rendezvous with a
comet and deploy a penetrator into its nucleus. Principal
Investigator: William V. Boynton, University of Arizona, Tuscon.
% Mars Polar Pathfinder involves a lander which will
carry out subsurface exploration of the northern Martian polar
cap by radar and a probe to measure ice quantities and
temperature. Principal Investigator: David A. Paige, University
of Calif. at Los Angeles.
"It was a difficult task narrowing the list down," said Dr.
Richard Vorder Bruegge, a member of the Discovery Advanced Study
Review Group which made the selections.
A formal competition to make final selections of the
missions to be conducted will be announced possibly next year.
"The formal selection process will be open to all interested
parties. Anyone will be able to submit a proposal for a
Discovery mission in the formal competition," said Vorder
Bruegge. "These proposals will have to be more extensive than
the studies and include science rationale, spacecraft design,
observations, data systems -- a start-to-finish proposal for a
new mission."
The 11 mission concepts selected follow the first two
Discovery missions selected for Phase A studies last year. They
are the Mars Environmental Survey (MESUR) Pathfinder, planned for
launch in 1996, and the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR),
planned for a 1998 launch.
Phase A studies of the MESUR Pathfinder mission was awarded
to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. (JPL). The
Applied Physics Laboratory of Johns Hopkins University,
Baltimore, Md. (APL), has been awarded Phase A studies of the
NEAR mission.
MESUR Pathfinder is envisioned as a technical demonstration
and validation flight for the MESUR program, scheduled to begin
in 1999. The MESUR program calls for building a network of about
16 small automated surface stations widely scattered around Mars
to study the planet's internal structure, meteorology and local
surface properties.
NEAR would spend up to a year station-keeping with a near-
Earth asteroid. The NEAR spacecraft, probably carrying only
three instruments, would assess the asteroid's mass, size,
density and spin rate, map its surface topography and
composition, determine its internal properties and study its
interaction with the interplanetary environment.
"The study of planets provides other planetary examples
against which to compare our own Earth, in order to understand
better how planet Earth works and how it behaves," said
Huntress. "The study of the solar system, and the planetary
bodies within it, also will help us to understand how our solar
system formed, how other solar systems might form around other
stars, and therefore lead us to answer whether or not there are
other Earths and other life in the universe.
"To understand the uniqueness of the Earth, we need to
understand the other rocky planets in the solar system --
Mercury, Venus and Mars. To find clues to the origin and
evolution of the solar system we need to examine and return
samples from the oldest and most primitive objects in the solar
system -- comets and asteroids," Huntress said.
The Discovery Program is managed by the Solar System
Exploration Division of the Office of Space Science and
Applications, NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C.
- end -
EDITOR'S NOTE: The Discovery Program Workshop Summary report,
containing a list of the 73 mission concepts presented at the
Discovery Mission Workshop at La Jolla, Calif., is available by
calling the NASA Headquarters Newsroom at 202/358-1600.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Never yell "Movie!" in a
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | crowded fire station.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.48 | Proposed mission ideas that did not make it - this time | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Thu Mar 04 1993 11:44 | 273 |
| Article: 58101
From: [email protected] (Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Jupiter and Venus followons (was Re: Refueling in orbit)
Date: 2 Mar 93 11:54:19 -0600
Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
In article <[email protected]>,
[email protected] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:
> In article <[email protected]> [email protected] (Henry
> Spencer) writes:
>
>>And if your science mission does succeed,
>>it's back to square one again (where are the followup missions for Galileo
>>or Magellan?).
Henry, you might look at the Discovery Program Workshop report. There
are, of course, no funded-and-approved followups but there is no
shortage of ideas. Two of the 11 finalists are Venus missions.
> % Venus Multiprobe Mission involves placement of 14
>small entry probes over one hemisphere of Venus to measure winds,
>temperature and pressure. Principal Investigator: Richard
>Goody, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.
> % Venus Composition Probe enters Venus' atmosphere in
>daylight to measure atmospheric structure and composition on a
>parachute descent. Principal Investigator: Larry W. Esposito,
>University of Colorado, Boulder.
A Jupiter mission is pretty hard to do on $150M, but there is one
tricky candidate. I don't know if it counts as a followon by your rules:
> % Earth Orbital Ultraviolet Jovian Observer will study
>the Jovian system from Earth orbit with a spectroscopic imaging
>telescope. Principal Investigator: Paul Feldman, Johns Hopkins
>University, Baltimore.
Rejected misions included:
Jupiter Polar Orbiter
Radio Science & Astronomy Mission for giant planets
Jupiter Skimming Orbiter
Io Mapper (send a copy of the Pluto Fast Flyby spacecraft to orbit Io)
Venus Orbiter-- Deep Atmosphere Temperature Sounder
Venus Atmospheric Dynamics Imaging Radiometer
A really strained acronym: "A Planetary/Heliospheric Recannaissance
of Dynamics: Ionosphere, Thermosphere, and Exosphere (APHRODITE)"
Venus Cloud Structure and Dynamics Lighntning Observations Upper Atmosphere
Loss Processes Discovery Mission (I think it's VCSADLOUALPDM, but they
seem to think it's CLOUD)
Venus 4-D Discovery Mission (look at atmosphere with NIMS, CCD camera, thermal
IR scanner)
Venus Geophysical Network Pathfinder (engineering test of 1-year(!) hard lander
using RTG-powered active refrigeration)
Discovery Venera Surface-Atmosphere Geochemistry Experiments (SAGE) (another
Venera lander)
Venus Interior Structure Mission (three Pioneer-Venus-type hard landers with
seismometers)
Discovery Mission Concept to Investigate Venus' [sic] Rotation and Atmospheric
Dynamics using Grounded and Floating Radio Beacons
(6 beacons on surface, 6 aloft. I would worry that anybody with such a
long-winded project name would have trouble with the "faster" part of
"faster, cheaper, better..." Also, I'd hate to trust a
spacecraft development program topeople who aren't sure how
to use apostrophes or capitalize.)
University Cooperative Venus Mission (atmosphere and plasma composition)
(Be warned: the report doesn't have more than a paragraph of description of
any of these. If you want juicy technical details you'll have to contact
the proposers themselves.)
Back to Matt:
> Galileo and Magellan *are* followup missions, to the Pioneer and Voyager
> series of probes.
Quite true. I've asked Magellan people about followups, but the data
set will be so overwhelming that it will be a decade before anybody
can figure out what to do with *better* radar imaging! Let's stick to
talking about Galileo.
> For myself, I'd like to see what Galileo discovers before
> trying to design a followup to it; there's no telling what we may want on
> the next probe.
A good point, but Galileo was launched in 1989 and you don't *need*
its results to start designing a successor. And it's easy to think of
many followups, some cheap, some expensive:
--To start with, a "Galileo" multidisciplinary orbiter for the other
three gas giants (Cassini represents one for Saturn)
--Ditto for atmospheric probe
--Orbiters to map all four Galilean satellites (can they carry gamma-ray
spectrometers, or is it hopeless in the radiation belts? Optical and
infrared multispectral, at least)
--A fleet of small particles-and-fields probe for looking at the Jovian
magnetosphere at several points simultaneously
--More atmosphere entry probes to study global variation in composition,
structure, clouds, weather, etc.
--Probes with longer duration than an hour or two (this is why Josh
Hopkins, Tom Nugent, and I are interested in balloons. Results from
Galileo's probe may help the engineering here.)
--Landers to do chemistry or seismometry on the Galileans, or maybe
smaller satellites
--Retrograde satellite mission which uses a Jupiter assist to chase the
outer retrograde satellites (good candidate for electric propulsion,
flyby or rendezvous; if you're ambitious it might even test Jovian
aerobraking)
There's a lot of science left to be done, just not much cash to spend
on it. In the long run I'd like to see a propellant plant operating
at the edges of the Jovian system, so exploration could be liberated
from the need to bring all its delta-V from Earth. Maybe Nick Szabo
will sell me one.
Bill Higgins, Beam Jockey | ASTRONOMY:
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory | The early science of the sky.
Bitnet: [email protected] | ASTROLOGY:
Internet: [email protected] | How it was paid for.
SPAN/Hepnet: 43011::HIGGINS | --Michael Rivero
Article: 58136
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: [email protected] (Anita Cochran)
Subject: Re: Jupiter and Venus followons (was Re: Refueling in orbit)
Organization: Univ. of Texas McDonald Observatory
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 1993 22:56:31 GMT
In article <[email protected]>, [email protected]
(Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey) writes:
> In article <[email protected]>,
> [email protected] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:
> >
> >>And if your science mission does succeed,
> >>it's back to square one again (where are the followup missions for Galileo
> >>or Magellan?).
>
> Back to Matt:
>
> > Galileo and Magellan *are* followup missions, to the Pioneer and Voyager
> > series of probes.
>
> Quite true. I've asked Magellan people about followups, but the data
> set will be so overwhelming that it will be a decade before anybody
> can figure out what to do with *better* radar imaging! Let's stick to
> talking about Galileo.
>
> > For myself, I'd like to see what Galileo discovers before
> > trying to design a followup to it; there's no telling what we may want on
> > the next probe.
>
> A good point, but Galileo was launched in 1989 and you don't *need*
> its results to start designing a successor. And it's easy to think of
> many followups, some cheap, some expensive:
Lots of good stuff about possible things we know we should do in a
follow-on mission deleted.
The choice of future missions is a combination of good science and
politics. People are certainly thinking about what should come next.
NASA has had several science working groups and strategy panels
working on it. In addition, there is currently a report being written
by the Committee on Planetary and Lunar Exploration (COMPLEX), a
standing committee of the National Research Council (National Academy)
which is a strategy document for the decade and a half from 1995-2010.
The COMPLEX report is a very important part of the planning process
since COMPLEX is not a NASA agency and is more or less independent of
the NASA politics. Its reports are fully refereed but are not in any
way controlled for input (I am a member of COMPLEX, which is why I
know so much about it).
The purpose of this report is strategy for the future. The important
thing is prioritizing the best science. But this is not done in a
vacuum. Politics does play into this. First, we are characterizing
what we know at different bodies. As one can guess, our depth of
knowledge is much greater at Jupiter than at Pluto or a comet. Thus,
future missions to Jupiter or Saturn have to be reasonably
sophisticated to add to our current knowledge base. In contrast, a
simple mission to Pluto or a comet would add substantially to our
knowledge.
Keeping all of this in mind, one has to look back over the past 2
decades and understand the trends in missions. Truly large missions
occur only once per decade in planetary exploration. In today's rough
financial times we cannot expect that to increase. Additionally,
Congress is looking more carefully at the total costs of the missions.
NASA used to go to Congress with costs to "launch+30" (what it will
cost to develop the spacecraft and instruments, launch it and run for
the first 30 days of shakeout). Then, they would expect Congress to
give them the costs of operating the mission and "borrow" this money
from other programs if need be. This tactic is changing and it is now
expected that NASA should understand the complete costs through EOM
(end of mission). This is why Cassini is no longer considered a $1.6B
mission but a $4B mission.
So, what is the future? Well, we can expect no more than 1 big
mission per decade and Cassini is the mission of the 1990s. There
might be one or more medium class missions ($400M to launch +30).
These might include Pluto Fast Flyby or MESUR (which is probably a
little large for this class) or Neptune or a comet mission.
The future for more continual access is the Discovery line which has
been proposed. Note, there is as yet no Discovery line approved but
the first 2 missions are selected: MESUR Pathfinder and NEAR. One
could argue with the politics of MESUR Pathfinder but NEAR is a
logical and solid choice. After these 2, if there is an after, there
is a long list of possibilities.
However, Discovery class missions are unlikely to do much for
follow-on for Jupiter or Saturn. Why? Because we know so much about
these two planets that the next mission will need to be fairly
sophisticated. And big antennae and RTGs and the like and long cruise
and science phases will easily drive the cost out of the Discovery
range ($150M).
Is this a bad thing? Well, it is if you want to study Jupiter or
Saturn. But this is where setting priorities comes in. Yes, we still
have a lot to learn about these planets but it might be more cost
effective to study comets or asteroids instead since we have so little
knowledge about these bodies. And whereas Jupiter studies tell you a
lot about atmospheric dynamics and this is important for comparative
planetology, comets tell you far more about Origins.
The COMPLEX report is slowly coming together. COMPLEX has not yet
done any of the prioritization. We have just catalogued the state of
the knowledge and identified the big and important questions to be
raised. The timescale is such that the report will be substantially
completed the 3rd week of July, then will go out for refereeing and
will be released sometime in early 1994 we hope.
I may regret this offer but... Anyway who has reasoned input on
priorities for planetary exploration (note we do not deal with the
earth, nor do we deal with specific missions) please send me e-mail
outlining the important issues and priorities in your mind. Note also
that COMPLEX is writing the report from the orientation of science.
While we recognize that exploration for its own sake is important, we
are not dealing with that concept but with what is important in science.
--
Anita Cochran uucp: !utastro!anita
arpa: [email protected]
snail: Astronomy Dept., The Univ. of Texas, Austin, TX, 78712
at&t: (512) 471-1471
Article: 58162
From: [email protected] (Pat)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: Jupiter and Venus followons (was Re: Refueling in orbit)
Date: 3 Mar 1993 08:04:42 -0500
Organization: Express Access Online Communications USA
Actually Bill, I would Posit, that the Discovery Series are The follow
Ons to Mariner/Voyager/Pioneer. Mariner really started off as a
series of Light fast missions to single targets, they just got a little
ambitious in voyager, but I think?????? they all used pretty mcuh the
same vehicle bus.
Magellan, I think used the the Mariner Mk II bus, but it's so far
different from the original mariner series as to be a whole new
spacecraft. Galileo, is one of a new series of spacecraft.
big, heavy,expensive and once ina lifetime.
Pat
|
| 550.49 | Earth-orbiting Jupiter probe design | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Mon Mar 08 1993 13:44 | 104 |
| Article: 58435
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: [email protected]
Subject: Proposed Jupiter f/c/b mission
Sender: [email protected]
Organization: Space Telescope Science Institute
Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1993 14:09:42 GMT
Last week Bill Higgins wrote:
>...you might look at the Discovery Program Workshop report.
>A Jupiter mission is pretty hard to do on $150M, but there is one
>tricky candidate. I don't know if it counts as a followon by your rules:
> % Earth Orbital Ultraviolet Jovian Observer will study
>the Jovian system from Earth orbit with a spectroscopic imaging
>telescope. Principal Investigator: Paul Feldman, Johns Hopkins
>University, Baltimore.
Since I've had the pleasure of working with Paul Feldman in the past
executing some of his HST proposals, I thought I'd go on and ask him
for some more information about this. The following has been extracted
from the information packet he put together for the Discovery Workshop
on Nov 17, 1992.
EARTH ORBITAL UV JOVIAN OBSERVER
Investigators: Fran Bagenal, Univ of Colorado
Michael J. S. Belton, NOAO
A. Lyle Broadfoot, Univ of Arizona
John T. Clark, Univ of Michigan
Alan Delamere, Ball Aerospace (Technical Lead)
Paul D. Feldman, Johns Hopkins Univ (PI)
Arthur L. Lane, JPL
David Skillman, Goddard SFC
Objectives
Focused, low-cost mission to study the Jovian system from
Earth orbit through ultraviolet (550 - 1750 angstroms)
spectroscopy and extrame ultraviolet (EUV) imaging.
Investigation of long-term temporal behavior of both Jupiter
and the Io plasma torus.
Approach
Integrated spacecraft and scientific instrument.
Utilize state-of-the-art off-the-shelf technology already
developed for NASA and DoD missions. No new development.
0.6 meter telescope in HEO (L1 point)
[the L1 point is the sunward Lagrange point]
Continuous viewing of Jupiter over 8 month period
Short time (< 3 years) from project start to launch
Single mission objective reduces cost of ground operations
Additional solar system science objectives (e.g., comets)
possible after end of Jupiter observations
Proposed Telescope Optics and Instrumentation
Telescope
60 cm diameter Cassegrain f/17 telescope design
Normal incidence optics using Silicon Carbide (SiC) coatings
to optimize UV signal
Pointing Control
Focal plane visible light CCD fine error sensor for
accurate pointing; selection of imaging or spectroscopy
requires no moving parts
Science Instrumentation
EUV Imager -- Spectral bandwith from 700 to 1450 angstroms.
The detector is a 224 x 960 pixel MAMA (Multi-Anode Microchannel
plate Array) with a KBr (Potassium Bromide) faceplate, and a
pixel size of 25 um = 0.5 arcseconds on the sky.
Long-slit Imaging Spectrograph -- Spectral range from 550 to
1750 angstroms. This instrument also uses a 224 x 960 MAMA
detector, but with a CsI (Cesium Iodide) faceplate. It utilizes
a 300 line per mm toroidal diffraction grating. Spectral
resolution is selectable for delta lambda either 2.5 or 10 angstroms.
The slit subtends one second of arc width on the sky.
The spectrograph has a 40 cm focal length and a f/17
focal ratio. The pixel scale in high resolution mode
is 1.25 angstroms per 25 um pixel.
As I mentioned above the planned orbit is at the L1 Lagrange point.
The mission would be launched aboard a Delta II and would employ
one ground station at Goddard Space Flight Center. Data storage would
utilize 250 Mbit solid state memory, and there would be one data dump
per day. This provides for a minimum of ground support.
The spacecraft has a design lifetime of two years, and an expected
mission duration of one year.
-Bill Gawne, Space Telescope Science Institute
"Forgive him, he is a barbarian, who thinks the customs of his tribe
are the laws of the universe." - G. J. Caesar
|
| 550.50 | JPL planetary images available | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Wed Mar 10 1993 17:32 | 133 |
| From: DECWRL::"[email protected]" "JPL Public Information"
9-MAR-1993
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Earth, Enceladus, Neptune GIFs at JPL Info site
GIF IMAGES AVAILABLE AT JPL INFO SITE
Several GIF images have been added to the JPL Info public access
computer site. JPL Info may be accessed by Internet via
anonymous ftp to pubinfo.jpl.nasa.gov (128.149.6.2); or by dialup
modem at +1 (818) 354-1333, up to 9600 bps, parameters N-8-1.
The GIF files are in the directory \news for the first 30 days,
after which they are moved to the directory \images.
The following GIF files were converted electronically from
digital spacecraft data. The default version of each GIF is
sized for 640x480 displays; a larger version is also provided.
EARTH.GIF 91K Galileo image of Earth from 1st flyby P-37330
EARTHX.GIF 225K Larger (800x800x256) version of EARTH.GIF
ENCELAD.GIF 169K Voyager image of Saturn moon Enceladus P-23955
ENCELADX.GIF 259K Larger (600x600x256) version of ENCELAD.GIF
NEPTUNE.GIF 119K Voyager image of Neptune P-34611
NEPTUNEX.GIF 211K Larger (650x650x256) version of NEPTUNE.GIF
Hardcopy prints of these images may be ordered with the "P"
number from the contractor company Newell Color Lab, 221 N.
Westmoreland Avenue, Los Angeles CA 90064 USA, telephone
+1 (213) 380-2980, fax +1 (213) 739-6984.
_________________________________________________________________
earth.gif:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PHOTO CAPTION P-37330
12/19/90
GLL-EM7 SSI
This color image of the Earth was obtained by Galileo at about
6:10 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on Dec. 11, 1990, when the
spacecraft was about 1.3 million miles from the planet during the
first of two Earth flybys on its way to Jupiter. The color
composite used images taken through the red, green and violet
filters. South America is near the center of the picture, and
the white, sunlit continent of Antarctica is below. Picturesque
weather fronts are visible in the South Atlantic, lower right.
This is the first frame of the Galileo Earth spin movie, a 500-
frame time-lapse motion picture showing a 25-hour period of
Earth's rotation and atmospheric dynamics. This GIF file was
converted electronically from original digital spacecraft data.
#####
_________________________________________________________________
encelad.gif:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE (213) 354-5011
PHOTO CAPTION Aug. 28, 1981
P-23955C/BW
S-2-50
This Voyager 2 mosaic of Enceladus was made from images taken
through the clear, violet and green filters Aug. 25, 1981, from a
distance of 119,000 kilometers (74,000 miles). In many ways, the
surface of this satellite of Saturn resembles that of Jupiter's
Galilean satellite Ganymede. Enceladus, however, is only
one-tenth Ganymede's size. Some regions of Enceladus show impact
craters up to 35 kilometers (22 miles) in diameter, whereas other
areas are smooth and uncratered. Linear sets of grooves tens of
kilometers long traverse the surface and are probably faults
resulting from deformation of the crust. The uncratered regions
are geologically young and suggest that Enceladus has experienced
a period of relatively recent internal melting. The rims of
several craters near the lower center of the picture have been
flooded by the smooth terrain. The satellite is about 500
kilometers (310 miles) in diameter and has the brightest and
whitest surface of any of Saturn's satellites. Features as small
as 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) are visible in this highest-
resolution view of Enceladus. The Voyager project is managed for
NASA by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. This
image was converted electronically to GIF format from original
digital data.
#####
_________________________________________________________________
neptune.gif:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PHOTO CAPTION August 21, 1989
P-34611
Voyager 2-N29
During August 16 and 17, 1989, the Voyager 2 narrow-angle camera
was used to photograph Neptune almost continuously, recording
approximately two and one-half rotations of the planet. These
images represent the most complete set of full-disc Neptune
images that the spacecraft acquired. This picture from the
sequence shows two of the four cloud features which have been
tracked by the Voyager cameras during the past two months. The
large, dark oval near the western limb (the left edge) -- dubbed
by Voyager scientists the Great Dark Spot -- is at a latitude of
22 degrees south and circuits Neptune every 18.3 hours. The
bright clouds immediately to the south and east of this oval are
seen to substantially change their appearances in periods as
short as four hours. The second dark spot, at 54 degrees south
latitude near the terminator (lower right edge), circuits Neptune
every 16.1 hours. This image has been processed to enhance the
visibility of small features, at some sacrifice of color
fidelity. The Voyager Mission is conducted by JPL for NASA's
Office of Space Science and Applications. This GIF file was
converted electronically from digital spacecraft data.
#####
- end -
% ====== Internet headers and postmarks (see DECWRL::GATEWAY.DOC) ======
% From: [email protected] (JPL Public Information)
% Subject: Earth, Enceladus, Neptune GIFs at JPL Info site
|
| 550.51 | Planetary probes to help look for gravity waves | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Fri Mar 19 1993 15:10 | 156 |
| Article: 931
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,sci.physics,alt.sci.planetary
Subject: Three Spacecraft to Conduct Gravity Wave Search
Date: 17 Mar 1993 23:47 UT
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Donald L. Savage
Headquarters, Washington, D.C. March 17, 1993
(Phone: 202/358-1727)
Franklin O'Donnell
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
(Phone: 818/354-5011)
RELEASE: 93-48
THREE SPACECRAFT TO CONDUCT 3-WEEK GRAVITATIONAL WAVE SEARCH
Three interplanetary spacecraft, now headed quietly toward Mars,
Jupiter and over the poles of the sun, soon may prove the
existence of elusive waves in the universe's gravitational field by
bobbing on ripples in space like corks bobbing on ripples in a pond.
Such waves of gravity have never been directly detected, although
their existence was predicted decades ago in Einstein's theory of
relativity and there is indirect evidence that they exist. The waves
are believed to be produced by supernova explosions, collapsing black
holes and other catastrophic events. Past searches with ground-based
equipment and single spacecraft have failed to discover them.
Astrophysicists are hoping to make this major discovery by
spending the next few weeks "listening" for passing gravitational
waves with three "borrowed" spacecraft at the same time in the most
sensitive detection system yet assembled to search for very low
frequency gravitational waves.
The spacecraft, now on their way to separate destinations in the
solar system, are NASA's Mars Observer, Galileo and the European
Space Agency (ESA) Ulysses spacecraft.
The joint NASA-ESA experiment will run from March 21 to April 11,
marking the first time three spacecraft will make observations
simultaneously, greatly increasing the reliability of any detection.
"If this experiment succeeds in detecting gravitational waves it
may answer fundamental questions about the nature of gravity as well
as give further support for Einstein's theory of general relativity,"
said Dr. Robert Stachnik, Gravitational Wave Program Scientist in
NASA's Astrophysics Div., Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C.
"We're also very excited about the possibility of making a major
discovery with such a cost-effective experiment. We were able to
take advantage of three spacecraft already in space which soon will be
in the correct relative positions and distances we need to do this
experiment. We can just borrow them for a few weeks, without any added
cost for equipment and no change to their missions. It's big science
on a small budget," Stachnik said.
"Einstein predicted the existence of gravitational waves in his
theory of general relativity, and radio astronomy observations of
pulsars have suggested they indeed exist -- but no one has ever
detected a gravitational wave directly," said Dr. John W. Armstrong of
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., who will work with
the Mars Observer and Galileo spacecraft.
The experiment is built around a simple concept. During the
3-week experiment, the antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN)
on Earth will beam radio signals to the three spacecraft at precisely
known frequencies. Each spacecraft will send signals back to Earth at
the same frequency it receives. If no gravitational waves are passing
through the Solar System, the signals returned to Earth should have
exactly the same frequencies as the original signals sent from the DSN,
shifted only by the Doppler effect of spacecraft motion.
However, if a strong enough gravitational wave passes -- produced
perhaps from collapsing masses of stars in the hearts of galaxies or
from the spiraling together and collision of two black holes -- both
the Earth and the spacecraft will experience a slight "bobbing" from
the ripple-like passage of the gravitational wave. This interaction
cannot be directly detected at either the Earth or the spacecraft
alone, but would show up as a slight change in the frequency of the
radio signal finally received back at Earth.
The hydrogen maser clocks that control the DSN transmitters and
receivers are so accurate that scientists will be able to detect a
change in radio frequency of as little as a few parts in a quadrillion
(a quadrillion is 1 followed by 15 zeroes).
"This should allow us to detect gravitational waves from objects
such as massive pairs of black holes hidden in the hearts of other
galaxies," said Hugo D. Wahlquist of JPL, who will work on the Ulysses
spacecraft with Sami W. Asmar of JPL, Prof. Bruno Bertotti of the
University of Pavia, Italy, and Prof. Luciano Iess of the University of
Rome La Sapienza.
Scientists emphasize, however, that snaring a gravitational wave
during the 3-week experiment will depend on a good bit of luck --
whether a suitable astronomical event happens to occur during the
relatively brief opportunity when data can be taken. All three
spacecraft will be in the Earth's night sky at that time, so
interference with their radio signals due to charged particles in the
solar wind will be at a minimum.
Successful detection of gravitational waves could open up an
entirely new kind of astronomy. Because the gravitational waves do not
readily interact with matter, detecting them may open a window
to the interiors of powerful -- and sometimes catastrophic -- events
such as supernova explosions and collapsing black holes.
"Gravitational wave research is now in the hands of physicists.
Once signals are detected, the astronomers will be beating down the
doors," said Stachnik.
Sensitive ground-based interferometer antennas now are being built
in both the United States and Europe to search for gravitational waves
with wavelengths of thousands of kilometers.
"In addition to searching for the shorter waves that can affect
antennas here on Earth, we now will be using radio signals sent to
spacecraft hundreds of millions of kilometers away to search for waves
of much longer wavelength," said Dr. Frank B. Estabrook of JPL, who
will work with the Galileo spacecraft.
Detection of the gravitational waves, even if they occur, will
still take at least several months of patient data analysis. "The
spacecraft systems can detect large enough gravitational waves, if they
exist," said Dr. Bevan M. French, Program Scientist for the Mars
Observer. "But it won't be one of those sudden 'Eureka!' situations.
We'll be looking for a few small wiggles in a huge amount of radio
data. It will take time."
To identify the unique signals of gravitational waves, the
scientists also will have to eliminate such mundane effects as
planned changes in the orientation of the spacecraft, interference from
charged particles (plasmas) in space and even atmospheric changes, rain
and snow on Earth.
Mars Observer, launched in September 1992, will reach the Red
Planet Aug. 24 of this year. Launched in 1989, NASA's Galileo
spacecraft will arrive at Jupiter in 1995. The ESA Ulysses spacecraft
was launched in 1990, and it will fly over the sun's poles in 1994 and
1995.
Gravitational wave research is supported by the Astrophysics
Division of NASA's Office of Space Science and by each of the
three spacecraft projects, which scheduled the radio searches during
their interplanetary cruise periods.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't ever take a fence
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | down until you know the
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | reason it was put up.
|
| 550.52 | Missing Missions | MAYDAY::ANDRADE | The sentinel (.)(.) | Thu Mar 25 1993 08:36 | 20 |
| Re .47 & .48 (Proposed and Selected Discovery Missions)
There seems to be a couple of missions missing on these lists.
I would think that the "Moon Resources Polar Orbiter" and the
"Mars Moons Rendevous/Composition Craft" (whatever the names)
would a least rate to get into the proposals list.
They are required pre-requisites for the future maned exploration
of the solar system. And they are good science too. For example
confirmation of the Mercury Polar Ice together with a discovery
of volatiles in the Moon's poles would be of great significance.
And kowing the composition the Martian Moons would clarify
questions as to their origin. As captured asteroids or not, etc.
As a matter of fact the USSR/Russians already tried and failed
to get this data. Could there exist some kind of Gentlemen's
agreement to the effect that the USA should not step on the
Russians toes and vice-versa.
Gil
|
| 550.53 | Planetary Missions Status Report -- 03/30/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Tue Mar 30 1993 15:45 | 102 |
| Article 3371 of sci.space.news:
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Path: nntpd2.cxo.dec.com!pa.dec.com!decwrl!ames!dont-send-mail-to-path-lines
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: JPL Mission Updates - 03/30/93
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Followup-To: sci.space
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41
Keywords: JPL
Sender: [email protected]
Nntp-Posting-Host: kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1993 17:35:00 GMT
Approved: [email protected]
Lines: 83
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
March 30, 1993
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft continue their
interstellar mission with fields-and-particles data acquisition.
Voyager 1, launched September 5, 1977, is currently 7.74 billion
kilometers (4.8 billion miles) from the Sun after flying by
Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980; Voyager 2, launched August
20, 1977, with flybys of Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus
(1986), and Neptune (1989), is now 5.94 billion kilometers (3.7
billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft is continuing its survey of the
gravitational field of Venus, utilizing precise navigation of the
spacecraft in the near-Venus portion of its elliptical orbit
through May 15, 1993. The science team released final global
maps of Venus's surface topography and various surface properties
at the 24th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston,
March 15-19. The Project plans to begin maneuvers to circularize
the orbit on May 25. Magellan was launched May 4, 1989, aboard
Space Shuttle Atlantis with an IUS injection stage; it radar-
mapped more than 98% of Venus's surface from September 1990 to
September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
go into orbit there on December 7, 1995. Galileo, Ulysses, and
Mars Orbiter are performing a joint radio-science gravity-wave
experiment from March 22 through April 12. Galileo spacecraft
performance and condition are excellent except that the high-gain
antenna is only partly deployed; science and engineering data are
being transmitted via the low-gain antenna. A 2.1-meter-per-
second trajectory-correction maneuver was performed March 9. The
Project is now planning the Jupiter mission and the August 1993
encounter with asteroid Ida assuming dependence on the low-gain
antenna. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, by Space Shuttle
Atlantis and an IUS, and flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in 1990
and 1992 for earlier gravity assists and asteroid Gaspra in
October 1991 for scientific observation.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
more than 20 degrees south of the ecliptic plane, in transit from
its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar
polar passages in 1994 and 1995. Ulysses is participating in the
gravity wave experiment with Galileo. Spacecraft condition and
performance are excellent, and cruise science data-gathering
continues. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European
Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990 aboard Space Shuttle
Discovery, with IUS and PAM-S stages.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/Poseidon: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. The mission to map ocean circulation has
produced interesting results related to the Central Pacific "El
Nino" phenomenon were presented in late February, and the
spacecraft has observed high North Atlantic waves associated with
this month's storms. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992,
aboard Ariane 52.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal, and
Mars Observer is on its planned trajectory leading to Mars orbit
insertion August 24, 1993. It is participating with Galileo and
Mars Observer in the joint gravity-wave experiment. A small
(0.46 meter-per-second) trajectory correction maneuver was
completed March 18. The project has determined that propellant
reserves will allow a faster-than-planned transfer to the final
Mars orbit, allowing science observations to start November 22,
1993, three weeks earlier than planned. Mars Observer was
launched aboard a Titan III/TOS vehicle on September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't ever take a fence
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | down until you know the
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | reason it was put up.
|
| 550.54 | Our Solar System at a Glance (alert) | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon May 03 1993 11:33 | 12 |
| The next reply is a JPL Information Summary titled
"Our Solar System at a Glance."
It summarizes information learned about the Solar System from our
planetary probes.
This reply is intended as an alert to DECwindows Notes users, since
the article is over 1100 lines long.
Regards,
John B.
|
| 550.55 | Our Solar System at a Glance (Full) | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon May 03 1993 11:34 | 1177 |
| Article 3634 of sci.space.news:
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Path: nntpd2.cxo.dec.com!pa.dec.com!decwrl!ames!dont-send-mail-to-path-lines
From: [email protected] (JPL Public Information)
Subject: JPL Info Summary/"Our Solar System at a Glance"
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Followup-To: sci.space
Sender: [email protected]
Nntp-Posting-Host: aremorica.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1993 22:52:26 GMT
Approved: [email protected]
Lines: 1160
This file and other text and image files from JPL missions are
available from the JPL Info public access computer site,
reachable by Internet via anonymous ftp to pubinfo.jpl.nasa.gov
(128.149.6.2); or by dialup modem to +1 (818) 354-1333, up to
9600 bits per second, parameters N-8-1.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Our Solar System at a Glance
Information Summary
PMS 010-A (JPL)
June 1991
JPL 410-34-1 6/91
NASA
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
California Institue of Technology
Pasadena, California
For a printed copy of this publication contact the public mail
office at the NASA center in your geographic region.
INTRODUCTION
From our small world we have gazed upon the cosmic ocean for
untold thousands of years. Ancient astronomers observed points of
light that appeared to move among the stars. They called these
objects planets, meaning wanderers, and named them after Roman
deities -- Jupiter, king of the gods; Mars, the god of war;
Mercury, messenger of the gods; Venus, the god of love and
beauty, and Saturn, father of Jupiter and god of agriculture. The
stargazers also observed comets with sparkling tails, and meteors
or shooting stars apparently falling from the sky.
Science flourished during the European Renaissance.
Fundamental physical laws governing planetary motion were
discovered, and the orbits of the planets around the Sun were
calculated. In the 17th century, astronomers pointed a new device
called the telescope at the heavens and made startling
discoveries.
But the years since 1959 have amounted to a golden age of
solar system exploration. Advancements in rocketry after World
War II enabled our machines to break the grip of Earth's gravity
and travel to the Moon and to other planets.
The United States has sent automated spacecraft, then
human-crewed expeditions, to explore the Moon. Our automated
machines have orbited and landed on Venus and Mars; explored the
Sun's environment; observed comets, and made close-range surveys
while flying past Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.
These travelers brought a quantum leap in our knowledge and
understanding of the solar system. Through the electronic sight
and other "senses" of our automated spacecraft, color and
complexion have been given to worlds that for centuries appeared
to Earth-bound eyes as fuzzy disks or indistinct points of light.
And dozens of previously unknown objects have been discovered.
Future historians will likely view these pioneering flights
through the solar system as some of the most remarkable
achievements of the 20th century.
AUTOMATED SPACECRAFT
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's)
automated spacecraft for solar system exploration come in many
shapes and sizes. While they are designed to fulfill separate and
specific mission objectives, the craft share much in common.
Each spacecraft consists of various scientific instruments
selected for a particular mission, supported by basic subsystems
for electrical power, trajectory and orientation control, as well
as for processing data and communicating with Earth.
Electrical power is required to operate the spacecraft
instruments and systems. NASA uses both solar energy from arrays
of photovoltaic cells and small nuclear generators to power its
solar system missions. Rechargeable batteries are employed for
backup and supplemental power.
Imagine that a spacecraft has successfully journeyed
millions of miles through space to fly but one time near a
planet, only to have its cameras and other sensing instruments
pointed the wrong way as it speeds past the target! To help
prevent such a mishap, a subsystem of small thrusters is used to
control spacecraft.
The thrusters are linked with devices that maintain a
constant gaze at selected stars. Just as Earth's early seafarers
used the stars to navigate the oceans, spacecraft use stars to
maintain their bearings in space. With the subsystem locked onto
fixed points of reference, flight controllers can keep a
spacecraft's scientific instruments pointed at the target body
and the craft's communications antennas pointed toward Earth. The
thrusters can also be used to fine-tune the flight path and speed
of the spacecraft to ensure that a target body is encountered at
the planned distance and on the proper trajectory.
Between 1959 and 1971, NASA spacecraft were dispatched to
study the Moon and the solar environment; they also scanned the
inner planets other than Earth -- Mercury, Venus and Mars. These
three worlds, and our own, are known as the terrestrial planets
because they share a solid-rock composition.
For the early planetary reconnaissance missions, NASA
employed a highly successful series of spacecraft called the
Mariners. Their flights helped shape the planning of later
missions. Between 1962 and 1975, seven Mariner missions conducted
the first surveys of our planetary neighbors in space.
All of the Mariners used solar panels as their primary power
source. The first and the final versions of the spacecraft had
two wings covered with photovoltaic cells. Other Mariners were
equipped with four solar panels extending from their octagonal
bodies.
Although the Mariners ranged from the Mariner 2 Venus
spacecraft, weighing in at 203 kilograms (447 pounds), to the
Mariner 9 Mars Orbiter, weighing in at 974 kilograms (2,147
pounds), their basic design remained quite similar throughout the
program. The Mariner 5 Venus spacecraft, for example, had
originally been a backup for the Mariner 4 Mars flyby. The
Mariner 10 spacecraft sent to Venus and Mercury used components
left over from the Mariner 9 Mars Orbiter program.
In 1972, NASA launched Pioneer 10, a Jupiter spacecraft.
Interest was shifting to four of the outer planets -- Jupiter,
Saturn, Uranus and Neptune -- giant balls of dense gas quite
different from the terrestrial worlds we had already surveyed.
Four NASA spacecraft in all -- two Pioneers and two Voyagers
-- were sent in the 1970s to tour the outer regions of our solar
system. Because of the distances involved, these travelers took
anywhere from 20 months to 12 years to reach their destinations.
Barring faster spacecraft, they will eventually become the first
human artifacts to journey to distant stars. Because the Sun's
light becomes so faint in the outer solar system, these travelers
do not use solar power but instead operate on electricity
generated by heat from the decay of radioisotopes.
NASA also developed highly specialized spacecraft to revisit
our neighbors Mars and Venus in the middle and late 1970s. Twin
Viking Landers were equipped to serve as seismic and weather
stations and as biology laboratories. Two advanced orbiters --
descendants of the Mariner craft -- carried the Viking Landers
from Earth and then studied martian features from above.
Two drum-shaped Pioneer spacecraft visited Venus in 1978.
The Pioneer Venus Orbiter was equipped with a radar instrument
that allowed it to "see" through the planet's dense cloud cover
to study surface features. The Pioneer Venus Multiprobe carried
four probes that were dropped through the clouds. The probes and
the main body -- all of which contained scientific instruments --
radioed information about the planet's atmosphere during their
descent toward the surface.
A new generation of automated spacecraft -- including
Magellan, Galileo, Ulysses, Mars Observer, the Comet
Rendezvous/Asteroid Flyby (CRAF) and Cassini -- is being
developed and sent out into the solar system to make detailed
examinations that will increase our understanding of our
neighborhood and our own planet.
The Sun
A discussion of the objects in the solar system must start
with the Sun. The Sun dwarfs the other bodies, representing
approximately 99.86 percent of all the mass in the solar system;
all of the planets, moons, asteroids, comets, dust and gas add up
to only about 0.14 percent. This 0.14 percent represents the
material left over from the Sun's formation. One hundred and nine
Earths would be required to fit across the Sun's disk, and its
interior could hold over 1.3 million Earths.
As a star, the Sun generates energy through the process of
fusion. The temperature at the Sun's core is 15 million degrees
Celsius (27 million degrees Fahrenheit), and the pressure there
is 340 billion times Earth's air pressure at sea level. The Sun's
surface temperature of 5,500 degrees Celsius (10,000 degrees
Fahrenheit) seems almost chilly compared to its core-temperature.
At the solar core, hydrogen can fuse into helium, producing
energy. The Sun also produces a strong magnetic field and streams
of charged particles, both extending far beyond the planets.
The Sun appears to have been active for 4.6 billion years
and has enough fuel to go on for another five billion years or
so. At the end of its life, the Sun will start to fuse helium
into heavier elements and begin to swell up, ultimately growing
so large that it will swallow Earth. After a billion years as a
"red giant," it will suddenly collapse into a "white dwarf" --
the final end product of a star like ours. It may take a trillion
years to cool off completely.
Many spacecraft have explored the Sun's environment, but
none have gotten any closer to its surface than approximately
two-thirds of the distance from Earth to the Sun. Pioneers 5-11,
the Pioneer Venus Orbiter, Voyagers 1 and 2 and other spacecraft
have all sampled the solar environment. The Ulysses spacecraft,
launched on October 6, 1990, is a joint solar mission of NASA and
the European Space Agency. After using Jupiter's gravity to
change its trajectory, Ulysses will fly over the Sun's polar
regions during 1994 and 1995 and will perform a wide range of
studies using nine onboard scientific instruments.
We are fortunate that the Sun is exactly the way it is. If
it were different in almost any way, life would almost certainly
never have developed on Earth.
Mercury
Obtaining the first close-up views of Mercury was the
primary objective of the Mariner 10 spacecraft, launched on
November 3, 1973, from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. After a
journey of nearly five months, which included a flyby of Venus,
the spacecraft passed within 703 kilometers (437 miles) of the
solar system's innermost planet on March 29, 1974.
Until Mariner 10, little was known about Mercury. Even the
best telescopic views from Earth showed Mercury as an indistinct
object lacking any surface detail. The planet is so close to the
Sun that it is usually lost in solar glare. When the planet is
visible on Earth's horizon just after sunset or before dawn, it
is obscured by the haze and dust in our atmosphere. Only radar
telescopes gave any hint of Mercury's surface conditions prior to
the voyage of Mariner 10.
The photographs Mariner 10 radioed back to Earth revealed an
ancient, heavily cratered surface, closely resembling our own
Moon. The pictures also showed huge cliffs crisscrossing the
planet. These apparently were created when Mercury's interior
cooled and shrank, buckling the planet's crust. The cliffs are as
high as 3 kilometers (2 miles) and as long as 500 kilometers (310
miles).
Instruments on Mariner 10 discovered that Mercury has a weak
magnetic field and a trace of atmosphere -- a trillionth the
density of Earth's atmosphere and composed chiefly of argon, neon
and helium. When the planet's orbit takes it closest to the Sun,
surface temperatures range from 467 degrees Celsius (872 degrees
Fahrenheit) on Mercury's sunlit side to -183 degrees Celsius
(-298 degrees Fahrenheit) on the dark side. This range in surface
temperature -- 650 degrees Celsius (1,170 degrees Fahrenheit) --
is the largest for a single body in the solar system. Mercury
literally bakes and freezes at the same time.
Days and nights are long on Mercury. The combination of a
slow rotation relative to the stars (59 Earth days) and a rapid
revolution around the Sun (88 Earth days) means that one Mercury
solar day takes 176 Earth days or two Mercury years -- the time
it takes the innermost planet to complete two orbits around the
Sun!
Mercury appears to have a crust of light silicate rock like
that of Earth. Scientists believe Mercury has a heavy iron-rich
core making up slightly less than half of its volume. That would
make Mercury's core larger, proportionally, than the Moon's core
or those of any of the planets.
After the initial Mercury encounter, Mariner 10 made two
additional flybys -- on September 21, 1974, and March 16, 1975 --
before control gas used to orient the spacecraft was exhausted
and the mission was concluded. Each flyby took place at the same
local Mercury time when the identical half of the planet was
illuminated; as a result, we still have not seen one-half of the
planet's surface.
Venus
Veiled by dense cloud cover, Venus -- our nearest planetary
neighbor -- was the first planet to be explored. The Mariner 2
spacecraft, launched on August 27, 1962, was the first of more
than a dozen successful American and Soviet missions to study the
mysterious planet. As spacecraft flew by or orbited Venus,
plunged into the atmosphere or gently landed on Venus' surface,
romantic myths and speculations about our neighbor were laid to
rest.
On December 14, 1962, Mariner 2 passed within 34,839
kilometers (21,648 miles) of Venus and became the first
spacecraft to scan another planet; onboard instruments measured
Venus for 42 minutes. Mariner 5, launched in June 1967, flew much
closer to the planet. Passing within 4,094 kilometers (2,544
miles) of Venus on the second American flyby, Mariner 5's
instruments measured the planet's magnetic field, ionosphere,
radiation belts and temperatures. On its way to Mercury, Mariner
10 flew by Venus and transmitted ultraviolet pictures to Earth
showing cloud circulation patterns in the Venusian atmosphere.
In the spring and summer of 1978, two spacecraft were
launched to further unravel the mysteries of Venus. On December 4
of the same year, the Pioneer Venus Orbiter became the first
spacecraft placed in orbit around the planet.
Five days later, the five separate components making up the
second spacecraft -- the Pioneer Venus Multiprobe -- entered the
Venusian atmosphere at different locations above the planet. The
four small, independent probes and the main body radioed
atmospheric data back to Earth during their descent toward the
surface. Although designed to examine the atmosphere, one of the
probes survived its impact with the surface and continued to
transmit data for another hour.
Venus resembles Earth in size, physical composition and
density more closely than any other known planet. However,
spacecraft have discovered significant differences as well. For
example, Venus' rotation (west to east) is retrograde (backward)
compared to the east-to-west spin of Earth and most of the other
planets.
Approximately 96.5 percent of Venus' atmosphere (95 times as
dense as Earth's) is carbon dioxide. The principal constituent of
Earth's atmosphere is nitrogen. Venus' atmosphere acts like a
greenhouse, permitting solar radiation to reach the surface but
trapping the heat that would ordinarily be radiated back into
space. As a result, the planet's average surface temperature is
482 degrees Celsius (900 degrees Fahrenheit), hot enough to melt
lead.
A radio altimeter on the Pioneer Venus Orbiter provided the
first means of seeing through the planet's dense cloud cover and
determining surface features over almost the entire planet.
NASA's Magellan spacecraft, launched on May 5, 1989, has been in
orbit around Venus since August 10, 1990. The spacecraft uses
radar-mapping techniques to provide ultrahigh-resolution images
of the surface.
Magellan has revealed a landscape dominated by volcanic
features, faults and impact craters. Huge areas of the surface
show evidence of multiple periods of lava flooding with flows
lying on top of previous ones. An elevated region named Ishtar
Terra is a lava-filled basin as large as the United States. At
one end of this plateau sits Maxwell Montes, a mountain the size
of Mount Everest. Scarring the mountain's flank is a
100-kilometer (62-mile) wide, 2.5-kilometer (1.5-mile) deep
impact crater named Cleopatra. (Almost all features on Venus are
named for women; Maxwell Montes, Alpha Regio and Beta Regio are
the exceptions.) Craters survive on Venus for perhaps 400 million
years because there is no water and very little wind erosion.
Extensive fault-line networks cover the planet, probably the
result of the same crustal flexing that produces plate tectonics
on Earth. But on Venus the surface temperature is sufficient to
weaken the rock, which cracks just about everywhere, preventing
the formation of major plates and large earthquake faults like
the San Andreas Fault in California.
Venus' predominant weather pattern is a high-altitude,
high-speed circulation of clouds that contain sulfuric acid. At
speeds reaching as high as 360 kilometers (225 miles) per hour,
the clouds circle the planet in only four Earth days. The
circulation is in the same direction -- west to east -- as Venus'
slow rotation of 243 Earth days, whereas Earth's winds blow in
both directions -- west to east and east to west -- in six
alternating bands. Venus' atmosphere serves as a simplified
laboratory for the study of our weather.
Earth
As viewed from space, our world's distinguishing
characteristics are its blue waters, brown and green land masses
and white clouds. We are enveloped by an ocean of air consisting
of 78 percent nitrogen, 21 percent oxygen and 1 percent other
constituents. The only planet in the solar system known to harbor
life, Earth orbits the Sun at an average distance of 150 million
kilometers (93 million miles). Earth is the third planet from the
Sun and the fifth largest in the solar system, with a diameter
just a few hundred kilometers larger than that of Venus.
Our planet's rapid spin and molten nickel-iron core give
rise to an extensive magnetic field, which, along with the
atmosphere, shields us from nearly all of the harmful radiation
coming from the Sun and other stars. Earth's atmosphere protects
us from meteors as well, most of which burn up before they can
strike the surface. Active geological processes have left no
evidence of the pelting Earth almost certainly received soon
after it formed -- about 4.6 billion years ago. Along with the
other newly formed planets, it was showered by space debris in
the early days of the solar system.
From our journeys into space, we have learned much about our
home planet. The first American satellite -- Explorer 1 -- was
launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida on January 31, 1958, and
discovered an intense radiation zone, now called the Van Allen
radiation belts, surrounding Earth.
Since then, other research satellites have revealed that our
planet's magnetic field is distorted into a tear-drop shape by
the solar wind -- the stream of charged particles continuously
ejected from the Sun. We've learned that the magnetic field does
not fade off into space but has definite boundaries. And we now
know that our wispy upper atmosphere, once believed calm and
uneventful, seethes with activity -- swelling by day and
contracting by night. Affected by changes in solar activity, the
upper atmosphere contributes to weather and climate on Earth.
Besides affecting Earth's weather, solar activity gives rise
to a dramatic visual phenomenon in our atmosphere. When charged
particles from the solar wind become trapped in Earth's magnetic
field, they collide with air molecules above our planet's
magnetic poles. These air molecules then begin to glow and are
known as the auroras or the northern and southern lights.
Satellites about 35,789 kilometers (22,238 miles) out in
space play a major role in daily local weather forecasting. These
watchful electronic eyes warn us of dangerous storms. Continuous
global monitoring provides a vast amount of useful data and
contributes to a better understanding of Earth's complex weather
systems.
From their unique vantage points, satellites can survey
Earth's oceans, land use and resources, and monitor the planet's
health. These eyes in space have saved countless lives, provided
tremendous conveniences and shown us that we may be altering our
planet in dangerous ways.
The Moon
The Moon is Earth's single natural satellite. The first
human footsteps on an alien world were made by American
astronauts on the dusty surface of our airless, lifeless
companion. In preparation for the human-crewed Apollo
expeditions, NASA dispatched the automated Ranger, Surveyor and
Lunar Orbiter spacecraft to study the Moon between 1964 and 1968.
NASA's Apollo program left a large legacy of lunar materials
and data. Six two-astronaut crews landed on and explored the
lunar surface between 1969 and 1972, carrying back a collection
of rocks and soil weighing a total of 382 kilograms (842 pounds)
and consisting of more than 2,000 separate samples.
From this material and other studies, scientists have
constructed a history of the Moon that includes its infancy.
Rocks collected from the lunar highlands date to about 4.0-4.3
billion years old. The first few million years of the Moon's
existence were so violent that few traces of this period remain.
As a molten outer layer gradually cooled and solidified into
different kinds of rock, the Moon was bombarded by huge asteroids
and smaller objects. Some of the asteroids were as large as Rhode
Island or Delaware, and their collisions with the Moon created
basins hundreds of kilometers across.
This catastrophic bombardment tapered off approximately four
billion years ago, leaving the lunar highlands covered with huge,
overlapping craters and a deep layer of shattered and broken
rock. Heat produced by the decay of radioactive elements began to
melt the interior of the Moon at depths of about 200 kilometers
(125 miles) below the surface. Then, for the next 700 million
years -- from about 3.8 to 3.1 billion years ago -- lava rose
from inside the Moon. The lava gradually spread out over the
surface, flooding the large impact basins to form the dark areas
that Galileo Galilei, an astronomer of the Italian Renaissance,
called maria, meaning seas.
As far as we can tell, there has been no significant
volcanic activity on the Moon for more than three billion years.
Since then, the lunar surface has been altered only by
micrometeorites, by the atomic particles from the Sun and stars,
by the rare impacts of large meteorites and by spacecraft and
astronauts. If our astronauts had landed on the Moon a billion
years ago, they would have seen a landscape very similar to the
one today. Thousands of years from now, the footsteps left by the
Apollo crews will remain sharp and clear.
The origin of the Moon is still a mystery. Four theories
attempt an explanation: the Moon formed near Earth as a separate
body; it was torn from Earth; it formed somewhere else and was
captured by our planet's gravity, or it was the result of a
collision between Earth and an asteroid about the size of Mars.
The last theory has some good support but is far from certain.
Mars
Of all the planets, Mars has long been considered the solar
system's prime candidate for harboring extraterrestrial life.
Astronomers studying the red planet through telescopes saw what
appeared to be straight lines crisscrossing its surface. These
observations -- later determined to be optical illusions -- led
to the popular notion that intelligent beings had constructed a
system of irrigation canals on the planet. In 1938, when Orson
Welles broadcast a radio drama based on the science fiction
classic War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells, enough people believed
in the tale of invading martians to cause a near panic.
Another reason for scientists to expect life on Mars had to
do with the apparent seasonal color changes on the planet's
surface. This phenomenon led to speculation that conditions might
support a bloom of martian vegetation during the warmer months
and cause plant life to become dormant during colder periods.
So far, six American missions to Mars have been carried out.
Four Mariner spacecraft -- three flying by the planet and one
placed into martian orbit -- surveyed the planet extensively
before the Viking Orbiters and Landers arrived.
Mariner 4, launched in late 1964, flew past Mars on July 14,
1965, coming within 9,846 kilometers (6,118 miles) of the
surface. Transmitting to Earth 22 close-up pictures of the
planet, the spacecraft found many craters and naturally occurring
channels but no evidence of artificial canals or flowing water.
Mariners 6 and 7 followed with their flybys during the summer of
1969 and returned 201 pictures. Mariners 4, 6 and 7 showed a
diversity of surface conditions as well as a thin, cold, dry
atmosphere of carbon dioxide.
On May 30, 1971, the Mariner 9 Orbiter was launched on a
mission to make a year-long study of the martian surface. The
spacecraft arrived five and a half months after lift-off, only to
find Mars in the midst of a planet-wide dust storm that made
surface photography impossible for several weeks. But after the
storm cleared, Mariner 9 began returning the first of 7,329
pictures; these revealed previously unknown martian features,
including evidence that large amounts of water once flowed across
the surface, etching river valleys and flood plains.
In August and September 1975, the Viking 1 and 2 spacecraft
-- each consisting of an orbiter and a lander -- lifted off from
Kennedy Space Center. The mission was designed to answer several
questions about the red planet, including, Is there life there?
Nobody expected the spacecraft to spot martian cities, but it was
hoped that the biology experiments on the Viking Landers would at
least find evidence of primitive life -- past or present.
Viking Lander 1 became the first spacecraft to successfully
touch down on another planet when it landed on July 20, 1976,
while the United States was celebrating its Bicentennial. Photos
sent back from the Chryse Planitia ("Plains of Gold") showed a
bleak, rusty-red landscape. Panoramic images returned by the
lander revealed a rolling plain, littered with rocks and marked
by rippled sand dunes. Fine red dust from the martian soil gives
the sky a salmon hue. When Viking Lander 2 touched down on Utopia
Planitia on September 3, 1976, it viewed a more rolling landscape
than the one seen by its predecessor -- one without visible
dunes.
The results sent back by the laboratory on each Viking
Lander were inconclusive. Small samples of the red martian soil
were tested in three different experiments designed to detect
biological processes. While some of the test results seemed to
indicate biological activity, later analysis confirmed that this
activity was inorganic in nature and related to the planet's soil
chemistry. Is there life on Mars? No one knows for sure, but the
Viking mission found no evidence that organic molecules exist
there.
The Viking Landers became weather stations, recording wind
velocity and direction as well as atmospheric temperature and
pressure. Few weather changes were observed. The highest
temperature recorded by either craft was -14 degrees Celsius (7
degrees Fahrenheit) at the Viking Lander 1 site in midsummer.
The lowest temperature, -120 degrees Celsius (-184 degrees
Fahrenheit), was recorded at the more northerly Viking Lander 2
site during winter. Near-hurricane wind speeds were measured at
the two martian weather stations during global dust storms, but
because the atmosphere is so thin, wind force is minimal. Viking
Lander 2 photographed light patches of frost -- probably
water-ice -- during its second winter on the planet.
The martian atmosphere, like that of Venus, is primarily
carbon dioxide. Nitrogen and oxygen are present only in small
percentages. Martian air contains only about 1/1,000 as much
water as our air, but even this small amount can condense out,
forming clouds that ride high in the atmosphere or swirl around
the slopes of towering volcanoes. Local patches of early morning
fog can form in valleys.
There is evidence that in the past a denser martian
atmosphere may have allowed water to flow on the planet. Physical
features closely resembling shorelines, gorges, riverbeds and
islands suggest that great rivers once marked the planet.
Mars has two moons, Phobos and Deimos. They are small and
irregularly shaped and possess ancient, cratered surfaces. It is
possible the moons were originally asteroids that ventured too
close to Mars and were captured by its gravity.
The Viking Orbiters and Landers exceeded by large margins
their design lifetimes of 120 and 90 days, respectively. The
first to fail was Viking Orbiter 2, which stopped operating on
July 24, 1978, when a leak depleted its attitude-control gas.
Viking Lander 2 operated until April 12, 1980, when it was shut
down because of battery degeneration. Viking Orbiter 1 quit on
August 7, 1980, when the last of its attitude-control gas was
used up. Viking Lander 1 ceased functioning on November 13, 1983.
Despite the inconclusive results of the Viking biology
experiments, we know more about Mars than any other planet except
Earth. NASA's Mars Observer spacecraft, to be launched in
September 1992, will expand our knowledge of the martian
environment and lead to human exploration of the red planet.
Asteroids
The solar system has a large number of rocky and metallic
objects that are in orbit around the Sun but are too small to be
considered full-fledged planets. These objects are known as
asteroids or minor planets. Most, but not all, are found in a
band or belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Some have
orbits that cross Earth's path, and there is evidence that Earth
has been hit by asteroids in the past. One of the least eroded,
best preserved examples is the Barringer Meteor Crater near
Winslow, Arizona.
Asteroids are material left over from the formation of the
solar system. One theory suggests that they are the remains of a
planet that was destroyed in a massive collision long ago. More
likely, asteroids are material that never coalesced into a
planet. In fact, if the estimated total mass of all asteroids was
gathered into a single object, the object would be only about
1,500 kilometers (932 miles) across -- less than half the
diameter of our Moon.
Thousands of asteroids have been identified from Earth. It
is estimated that 100,000 are bright enough to eventually be
photographed through Earth-based telescopes.
Much of our understanding about asteroids comes from
examining pieces of space debris that fall to the surface of
Earth. Asteroids that are on a collision course with Earth are
called meteoroids. When a meteoroid strikes our atmosphere at
high velocity, friction causes this chunk of space matter to
incinerate in a streak of light known as a meteor. If the
meteoroid does not burn up completely, what's left strikes
Earth's surface and is called a meteorite. One of the best places
to look for meteorites is the ice cap of Antarctica.
Of all the meteorites examined, 92.8 percent are composed of
silicate (stone), and 5.7 percent are composed of iron and
nickel; the rest are a mixture of the three materials. Stony
meteorites are the hardest to identify since they look very much
like terrestrial rocks.
Since asteroids are material from the very early solar
system, scientists are interested in their composition.
Spacecraft that have flown through the asteroid belt have found
that the belt is really quite empty and that asteroids are
separated by very large distances.
Current and future missions will fly by selected asteroids
for closer examination. The Galileo Orbiter, launched by NASA in
October 1989, will investigate main-belt asteroids on its way to
Jupiter. The Comet Rendezvous/Asteroid Flyby (CRAF) and Cassini
missions will also study these far-flung objects. Scheduled for
launch in the latter part of the 1990s, the CRAF and Cassini
missions are a collaborative project of NASA, the European Space
Agency and the federal space agencies of Germany and Italy, as
well as the United States Air Force and the Department of Energy.
One day, space factories will mine the asteroids for raw
materials.
Jupiter
Beyond Mars and the asteroid belt, in the outer regions of
our solar system, lie the giant planets of Jupiter, Saturn,
Uranus and Neptune. In 1972, NASA dispatched the first of four
spacecraft slated to conduct the initial surveys of these
colossal worlds of gas and their moons of ice and rock. Jupiter
was the first port of call.
Pioneer 10, which lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in
March 1972, was the first spacecraft to penetrate the asteroid
belt and travel to the outer regions of the solar system. In
December 1973, it returned the first close-up images of Jupiter,
flying within 132,252 kilometers (82,178 miles) of the planet's
banded cloud tops. Pioneer 11 followed a year later. Voyagers 1
and 2 were launched in the summer of 1977 and returned
spectacular photographs of Jupiter and its family of satellites
during flybys in 1979.
These travelers found Jupiter to be a whirling ball of
liquid hydrogen and helium, topped with a colorful atmosphere
composed mostly of gaseous hydrogen and helium. Ammonia ice
crystals form white Jovian clouds. Sulfur compounds (and perhaps
phosphorus) may produce the brown and orange hues that
characterize Jupiter's atmosphere.
It is likely that methane, ammonia, water and other gases
react to form organic molecules in the regions between the
planet's frigid cloud tops and the warmer hydrogen ocean lying
below. Because of Jupiter's atmospheric dynamics, however, these
organic compounds -- if they exist -- are probably short-lived.
The Great Red Spot has been observed for centuries through
telescopes on Earth. This hurricane-like storm in Jupiter's
atmosphere is more than twice the size of our planet. As a
high-pressure region, the Great Red Spot spins in a direction
opposite to that of low-pressure storms on Jupiter; it is
surrounded by swirling currents that rotate around the spot and
are sometimes consumed by it. The Great Red Spot might be a
million years old.
Our spacecraft detected lightning in Jupiter's upper
atmosphere and observed auroral emissions similar to Earth's
northern lights at the Jovian polar regions. Voyager 1 returned
the first images of a faint, narrow ring encircling Jupiter.
Largest of the solar system's planets, Jupiter rotates at a
dizzying pace -- once every 9 hours 55 minutes 30 seconds. The
massive planet takes almost 12 Earth years to complete a journey
around the Sun. With 16 known moons, Jupiter is something of a
miniature solar system.
A new mission to Jupiter -- the Galileo Project -- is under
way. After a six- year cruise that takes the Galileo Orbiter once
past Venus, twice past Earth and the Moon and once past two
asteroids, the spacecraft will drop an atmospheric probe into
Jupiter's cloud layers and relay data back to Earth. The Galileo
Orbiter will spend two years circling the planet and flying close
to Jupiter's large moons, exploring in detail what the two
Pioneers and two Voyagers revealed.
Galilean Satellites
In 1610, Galileo Galilei aimed his telescope at Jupiter and
spotted four points of light orbiting the planet. For the first
time, humans had seen the moons of another world. In honor of
their discoverer, these four bodies would become known as the
Galilean satellites or moons. But Galileo might have happily
traded this honor for one look at the dazzling photographs
returned by the Voyager spacecraft as they flew past these
planet-sized satellites.
One of the most remarkable findings of the Voyager mission
was the presence of active volcanoes on the Galilean moon Io.
Volcanic eruptions had never before been observed on a world
other than Earth. The Voyager cameras identified at least nine
active volcanoes on Io, with plumes of ejected material extending
as far as 280 kilometers (175 miles) above the moon's surface.
Io's pizza-colored terrain, marked by orange and yellow
hues, is probably the result of sulfur-rich materials brought to
the surface by volcanic activity. Volcanic activity on this
satellite is the result of tidal flexing caused by the
gravitational tug-of-war between Io, Jupiter and the other three
Galilean moons.
Europa, approximately the same size as our Moon, is the
brightest Galilean satellite. The moon's surface displays a
complex array of streaks, indicating the crust has been
fractured. Caught in a gravitational tug-of-war like Io, Europa
has been heated enough to cause its interior ice to melt --
apparently producing a liquid-water ocean. This ocean is covered
by an ice crust that has formed where water is exposed to the
cold of space. Europa's core is made of rock that sank to its
center.
Like Europa, the other two Galilean moons -- Ganymede and
Callisto -- are worlds of ice and rock. Ganymede is the largest
satellite in the solar system -- larger than the planets Mercury
and Pluto. The satellite is composed of about 50 percent water or
ice and the rest rock. Ganymede's surface has areas of different
brightness, indicating that, in the past, material oozed out of
the moon's interior and was deposited at various locations on the
surface.
Callisto, only slightly smaller than Ganymede, has the
lowest density of any Galilean satellite, suggesting that large
amounts of water are part of its composition. Callisto is the
most heavily cratered object in the solar system; no activity
during its history has erased old craters except more impacts.
Detailed studies of all the Galilean satellites will be
performed by the Galileo Orbiter.
Saturn
No planet in the solar system is adorned like Saturn. Its
exquisite ring system is unrivaled. Like Jupiter, Saturn is
composed mostly of hydrogen. But in contrast to the vivid colors
and wild turbulence found in Jovian clouds, Saturn's atmosphere
has a more subtle, butterscotch hue, and its markings are muted
by high-altitude haze. Given Saturn's somewhat placid-looking
appearance, scientists were surprised at the high-velocity
equatorial jet stream that blows some 1,770 kilometers (1,100
miles) per hour.
Three American spacecraft have visited Saturn. Pioneer 11
sped by the planet and its moon Titan in September 1979,
returning the first close-up images. Voyager 1 followed in
November 1980, sending back breathtaking photographs that
revealed for the first time the complexities of Saturn's ring
system and moons. Voyager 2 flew by the planet and its moons in
August 1981.
The rings are composed of countless low-density particles
orbiting individually around Saturn's equator at progressive
distances from the cloud tops. Analysis of spacecraft radio waves
passing through the rings showed that the particles vary widely
in size, ranging from dust to house-sized boulders. The rings are
bright because they are mostly ice and frosted rock.
The rings might have resulted when a moon or a passing body
ventured too close to Saturn. The unlucky object would have been
torn apart by great tidal forces on its surface and in its
interior. Or the object may not have been fully formed to begin
with and disintegrated under the influence of Saturn's gravity. A
third possibility is that the object was shattered by collisions
with larger objects orbiting the planet.
Unable either to form into a moon or to drift away from each
other, individual ring particles appear to be held in place by
the gravitational pull of Saturn and its satellites. These
complex gravitational interactions form the thousands of ringlets
that make up the major rings.
Radio emissions quite similar to the static heard on an AM
car radio during an electrical storm were detected by the Voyager
spacecraft. These emissions are typical of lightning but are
believed to be coming from Saturn's ring system rather than its
atmosphere, where no lightning was observed. As they had at
Jupiter, the Voyagers saw a version of Earth's auroras near
Saturn's poles.
The Voyagers discovered new moons and found several
satellites that share the same orbit. We learned that some moons
shepherd ring particles, maintaining Saturn's rings and the gaps
in the rings. Saturn's 18th moon was discovered in 1990 from
images taken by Voyager 2 in 1981.
Voyager 1 determined that Titan has a nitrogen-based
atmosphere with methane and argon -- one more like Earth's in
composition than the carbon dioxide atmospheres of Mars and
Venus. Titan's surface temperature of -179 degrees Celsius (-290
degrees Fahrenheit) implies that there might be water-ice islands
rising above oceans of ethane-methane liquid or sludge.
Unfortunately, Voyager's cameras could not penetrate the moon's
dense clouds.
Continuing photochemistry from solar radiation may be
converting Titan's methane to ethane, acetylene and -- in
combination with nitrogen -- hydrogen cyanide. The latter
compound is a building block of amino acids. These conditions may
be similar to the atmospheric conditions of primeval Earth
between three and four billion years ago. However, Titan's
atmospheric temperature is believed to be too low to permit
progress beyond this stage of organic chemistry.
The exploration of Saturn will continue with the Cassini
mission. The Cassini spacecraft will orbit the planet and will
also deploy a probe called Huygens, which will be dropped into
Titan's atmosphere and fall to the surface. Cassini will use the
probe as well as radar to peer through Titan's clouds and will
spend years examining the Saturnian system.
Uranus
In January 1986, four and a half years after visiting
Saturn, Voyager 2 completed the first close-up survey of the
Uranian system. The brief flyby revealed more information about
Uranus and its retinue of icy moons than had been gleaned from
ground observations since the planet's discovery over two
centuries ago by the English astronomer William Herschel.
Uranus, third largest of the planets, is an oddball of the
solar system. Unlike the other planets (with the exception of
Pluto), this giant lies tipped on its side with its north and
south poles alternately facing the sun during an 84-year swing
around the solar system. During Voyager 2's flyby, the south pole
faced the Sun. Uranus might have been knocked over when an
Earth-sized object collided with it early in the life of the
solar system.
Voyager 2 found that Uranus' magnetic field does not follow
the usual north-south axis found on the other planets. Instead,
the field is tilted 60 degrees and offset from the planet's
center, a phenomenon that on Earth would be like having one
magnetic pole in New York City and the other in the city of
Djakarta, on the island of Java in Indonesia.
Uranus' atmosphere consists mainly of hydrogen, with some 12
percent helium and small amounts of ammonia, methane and water
vapor. The planet's blue color occurs because methane in its
atmosphere absorbs all other colors. Wind speeds range up to 580
kilometers (360 miles) per hour, and temperatures near the cloud
tops average -221 degrees Celsius (-366 degrees Fahrenheit).
Uranus' sunlit south pole is shrouded in a kind of
photochemical "smog" believed to be a combination of acetylene,
ethane and other sunlight-generated chemicals. Surrounding the
planet's atmosphere and extending thousands of kilometers into
space is a mysterious ultraviolet sheen known as "electroglow."
Approximately 8,000 kilometers (5,000 miles) below Uranus'
cloud tops, there is thought to be a scalding ocean of water and
dissolved ammonia some 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles) deep.
Beneath this ocean is an Earth-sized core of heavier materials.
Voyager 2 discovered 10 new moons, 16-169 kilometers (10-105
miles) in diameter, orbiting Uranus. The five previously known --
Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon -- range in size from
520 to 1,610 kilometers (323 to 1,000 miles) across. Representing
a geological showcase, these five moons are half-ice, half-rock
spheres that are cold and dark and show evidence of past
activity, including faulting and ice flows.
The most remarkable of Uranus' moons is Miranda. Its surface
features high cliffs as well as canyons, crater-pocked plains and
winding valleys. The sharp variations in terrain suggest that,
after the moon formed, it was smashed apart by a collision with
another body -- an event not unusual in our solar system, which
contains many objects that have impact craters or are fragments
from large impacts. What is extraordinary is that Miranda
apparently reformed with some of the material that had been in
its interior exposed on its surface.
Uranus was thought to have nine dark rings; Voyager 2 imaged
11. In contrast to Saturn's rings, which are composed of bright
particles, Uranus' rings are primarily made up of dark,
boulder-sized chunks.
Neptune
Voyager 2 completed its 12-year tour of the solar system
with an investigation of Neptune and the planet's moons. On
August 25, 1989, the spacecraft swept to within 4,850 kilometers
(3,010 miles) of Neptune and then flew on to the moon Triton.
During the Neptune encounter it became clear that the planet's
atmosphere was more active than Uranus'.
Voyager 2 observed the Great Dark Spot, a circular storm the
size of Earth, in Neptune's atmosphere. Resembling Jupiter's
Great Red Spot, the storm spins counterclockwise and moves
westward at almost 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) per hour. Voyager
2 also noted a smaller dark spot and a fast-moving cloud dubbed
the "Scooter," as well as high-altitude clouds over the main
hydrogen and helium cloud deck. The highest wind speeds of any
planet were observed, up to 2,400 kilometers (1,500 miles) per
hour.
Like the other giant planets, Neptune has a gaseous hydrogen
and helium upper layer over a liquid interior. The planet's core
contains a higher percentage of rock and metal than those of the
other gas giants. Neptune's distinctive blue appearance, like
Uranus' blue color, is due to atmospheric methane.
Neptune's magnetic field is tilted relative to the planet's
spin axis and is not centered at the core. This phenomenon is
similar to Uranus' magnetic field and suggests that the fields of
the two giants are being generated in an area above the cores,
where the pressure is so great that liquid hydrogen assumes the
electrical properties of a metal. Earth's magnetic field, on the
other hand, is produced by its spinning metallic core and is only
slightly tilted and offset relative to its center.
Voyager 2 also shed light on the mystery of Neptune's rings.
Observations from Earth indicated that there were arcs of
material in orbit around the giant planet. It was not clear how
Neptune could have arcs and how these could be kept from
spreading out into even, unclumped rings. Voyager 2 detected
these arcs, but they were, in fact, part of thin, complete rings.
A number of small moons could explain the arcs, but such bodies
were not spotted.
Astronomers had identified the Neptunian moons Triton in
1846 and Nereid in 1949. Voyager 2 found six more. One of the new
moons -- Proteus -- is actually larger than Nereid, but since
Proteus orbits close to Neptune, it was lost in the planet's
glare for observers on Earth.
Triton circles Neptune in a retrograde orbit in under six
days. Tidal forces on Triton are causing it to spiral slowly
towards the planet. In 10 to 100 million years (a short time in
astronomical terms), the moon will be so close that Neptunian
gravity will tear it apart, forming a spectacular ring to
accompany the planet's modest current rings.
Triton's landscape is as strange and unexpected as those of
Io and Miranda. The moon has more rock than its counterparts at
Saturn and Uranus. Triton's mantle is probably composed of
water-ice, but the moon's crust is a thin veneer of nitrogen and
methane. The moon shows two dramatically different types of
terrain: the so-called "cantaloupe" terrain and a receding ice
cap.
Dark streaks appear on the ice cap. These streaks are the
fallout from geyser-like volcanic vents that shoot nitrogen gas
and dark, fine-grained particles to heights of 2 to 8 kilometers
(1 to 5 miles). Triton's thin atmosphere, only 1/70,000th as
thick as Earth's, has winds that carry the dark particles and
deposit them as streaks on the ice cap -- the coldest surface yet
found in the solar system (-235 degrees Celsius, -391 degrees
Fahrenheit). Triton might be more like Pluto than any other
object spacecraft have so far visited.
Pluto
Pluto is the most distant of the planets, yet the
eccentricity of its orbit periodically carries it inside
Neptune's orbit, where it has been since 1979 and where it will
remain until March 1999. Pluto's orbit is also highly inclined --
tilted 17 degrees to the orbital plane of the other planets.
Discovered in 1930, Pluto appears to be little more than a
celestial snowball. The planet's diameter is calculated to be
approximately 2,300 kilometers (1,430 miles), only two-thirds the
size of our Moon. Ground-based observations indicate that Pluto's
surface is covered with methane ice and that there is a thin
atmosphere that may freeze and fall to the surface as the planet
moves away from the Sun. Observations also show that Pluto's spin
axis is tipped by 122 degrees.
The planet has one known satellite, Charon, discovered in
1978. Charon's surface composition is different from Pluto's: the
moon appears to be covered with water-ice rather than methane
ice. Its orbit is gravitationally locked with Pluto, so both
bodies always keep the same hemisphere facing each other. Pluto's
and Charon's rotational period and Charon's period of revolution
are all 6.4 Earth days.
Although no spacecraft have ever visited Pluto, NASA is
currently exploring the possibility of such a mission.
Comets
The outermost members of the solar system occasionally pay a
visit to the inner planets. As asteroids are the rocky and
metallic remnants of the formation of the solar system, comets
are the icy debris from that dim beginning and can survive only
far from the Sun. Most comet nuclei reside in the Oort Cloud, a
loose swarm of objects in a halo beyond the planets and reaching
perhaps halfway to the nearest star.
Comet nuclei orbit in this frozen abyss until they are
gravitationally perturbed into new orbits that carry them close
to the Sun. As a nucleus falls inside the orbits of the outer
planets, the volatile elements of which it is made gradually
warm; by the time the nucleus enters the region of the inner
planets, these volatile elements are boiling. The nucleus itself
is irregular and only a few miles across, and is made principally
of water-ice with methane and ammonia -- materials very similar
to those composing the moons of the giant planets.
As these materials boil off of the nucleus, they form a coma
or cloud-like "head" that can measure tens of thousands of
kilometers across. The coma grows as the comet gets closer to the
Sun. The stream of charged particles coming from the Sun pushes
on this cloud, blowing it back like a flag in the wind and giving
rise to the comet's "tails." Gases and ions are blown directly
back from the nucleus, but dust particles are pushed more slowly.
As the nucleus continues in its orbit, the dust particles are
left behind in a curved arc.
Both the gas and dust tails point away from the Sun; in
effect, the comet chases its tails as it recedes from the Sun.
The tails can reach 150 million kilometers (93 million miles) in
length, but the total amount of material contained in this
dramatic display would fit in an ordinary suitcase. Comets --
from the Latin cometa, meaning "long-haired" -- are essentially
dramatic light shows.
Some comets pass through the solar system only once, but
others have their orbits gravitationally modified by a close
encounter with one of the giant outer planets. These latter
visitors can enter closed elliptical orbits and repeatedly return
to the inner solar system.
Halley's Comet is the most famous example of a relatively
short period comet, returning on an average of once every 76
years and orbiting from beyond Neptune to within Venus' orbit.
Confirmed sightings of the comet go back to 240 B.C. This regular
visitor to our solar system is named for Sir Edmond Halley,
because he plotted the comet's orbit and predicted its return,
based on earlier sightings and Newtonian laws of motion. His name
became part of astronomical lore when, in 1759, the comet
returned on schedule. Unfortunately, Sir Edmond did not live to
see it.
A comet can be very prominent in the sky if it passes
comparatively close to Earth. Unfortunately, on its most recent
appearance, Halley's Comet passed no closer than 62.4 million
kilometers (38.8 million miles) from our world. The comet was
visible to the naked eye, especially for viewers in the southern
hemisphere, but it was not spectacular. Comets have been so
bright, on rare occasions, that they were visible during daytime.
Historically, comet sightings have been interpreted as bad omens
and have been artistically rendered as daggers in the sky.
The Comet Rendezvous/Asteroid Flyby (CRAF) spacecraft will
become the first traveler to fly close to a comet nucleus and
remain in proximity to it as they both approach the Sun. CRAF
will observe the nucleus as it becomes active in the growing
sunlight and begins to have its lighter elements boil off and
form a coma and tails. Several spacecraft have flown by comets at
high speed; the first was NASA's International Cometary Explorer
in 1985. An armada of five spacecraft (two Japanese, two Soviet
and the Giotto spacecraft from the European Space Agency) flew by
Halley's Comet in 1986.
Conclusion
Despite their efforts to peer across the vast distances of
space through an obscuring atmosphere, scientists of the past had
only one body they could study closely -- Earth. But since 1959,
spaceflight through the solar system has lifted the veil on our
neighbors in space.
We have learned more about our solar system and its members
than anyone had in the previous thousands of years. Our automated
spacecraft have traveled to the Moon and to all the planets
beyond our world except Pluto; they have observed moons as large
as small planets, flown by comets and sampled the solar
environment. Astronomy books now include detailed pictures of
bodies that were only smudges in the largest telescopes for
generations. We are lucky to be alive now to see these strange
and beautiful places and objects.
The knowledge gained from our journeys through the solar
system has redefined traditional Earth sciences like geology and
meteorology and spawned an entirely new discipline called
comparative planetology. By studying the geology of planets,
moons, asteroids and comets, and comparing differences and
similarities, we are learning more about the origin and history
of these bodies and the solar system as a whole.
We are also gaining insight into Earth's complex weather
systems. By seeing how weather is shaped on other worlds and by
investigating the Sun's activity and its influence throughout the
solar system, we can better understand climatic conditions and
processes on Earth.
We will continue to learn and benefit as our automated
spacecraft explore our neighborhood in space. One current mission
is mapping Venus; others are flying between worlds and will reach
the Sun and Jupiter after complex trajectory adjustments. Future
missions are planned for Mars, Saturn, a comet and the asteroid
belt.
We can also look forward to the time when humans will once
again set foot on an alien world. Although astronauts have not
been back to the Moon since December 1972, plans are being
formulated for our return to the lunar landscape and for the
human exploration of Mars and even the establishment of martian
outposts. One day, taking a holiday may mean spending a week at a
lunar base or a martian colony!
- end -
|
| 550.56 | Planetary Missions Status Report -- 04/27/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Wed May 05 1993 11:01 | 90 |
| Article 3681 of sci.space.news:
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
Path: nntpd2.cxo.dec.com!pa.dec.com!decwrl!ames!dont-send-mail-to-path-lines
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: JPL Mission Updates - 04/27/93
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Followup-To: sci.space
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41
Keywords: JPL
Sender: [email protected]
Nntp-Posting-Host: kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Tue, 4 May 1993 22:00:00 GMT
Approved: [email protected]
Lines: 71
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
April 27, 1993
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft continue their
interstellar mission with fields-and-particles data acquisition.
Voyager 1, launched September 5, 1977, is currently 7.8 billion
kilometers (4.8 billion miles) from the Sun, receding at 17.6 km
per second, after flying by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980;
Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, to fly by Jupiter (1979),
Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986), and Neptune (1989), is now 5.97
billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft is continuing its survey of the
gravitational field of Venus, utilizing precise navigation of the
spacecraft in the near-Venus portion of its elliptical orbit,
through May 15, 1993. The Project plans to begin maneuvers to
circularize the orbit on May 25. Magellan was launched May 4,
1989, aboard Space Shuttle Atlantis with an IUS injection stage;
it radar-mapped more than 98% of Venus's surface from September
1990 to September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
go into orbit there on December 7, 1995. Spacecraft performance
and condition are excellent except that the high-gain antenna is
only partly deployed; science and engineering data are being
transmitted via the low-gain antenna. The Project is now
planning to use the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter mission and
the August 1993 encounter with asteroid Ida. Galileo was
launched October 18, 1989, by Space Shuttle Atlantis and an IUS,
and flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for earlier
gravity assists and asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 for
scientific observation.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
almost 30 degrees south (relative to the Sun's equator), in
transit from its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward
its solar polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in
1994 and 1995. Ulysses spacecraft condition and performance are
excellent, and cruise science data-gathering continues. The
Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space Agency and
launched October 6, 1990 aboard Space Shuttle Discovery, with IUS
and PAM-S stages.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/Poseidon: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. The mission is to map ocean circulation.
TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992, aboard Ariane 52.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal, and
Mars Observer is on its planned trajectory leading to Mars orbit
insertion August 24, 1993, with the mapping orbit attained
November 8 and science operations planned to start November 22.
The Joint Gravitational Wave Experiment, in which Mars Observer
was joined by Ulysses and Galileo, completed data-gathering April
12, and data analysis has begun. Mars Observer was launched
aboard a Titan III/TOS vehicle on September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Once a year, go someplace
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | you've never been before.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.57 | Planetary Missions Status Report -- 05/27/93 | CXDOCS::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Wed Jun 02 1993 18:26 | 87 |
| Article: 3814
Newsgroups: sci.space.news
From: [email protected] (Ron Baalke)
Subject: JPL Mission Updates - 05/27/93
Sender: [email protected]
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Date: Thu, 27 May 1993 17:34:00 GMT
Forwarded from:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
May 27, 1993
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
enter orbit December 7, 1995. Spacecraft performance and
condition are excellent except that the high-gain antenna is only
partly deployed; science and engineering data are being
transmitted via the low-gain antenna. The mission team is
planning to use the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter mission and
for the encounter August 28, 1993 with asteroid Ida. Galileo was
launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in
1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by asteroid Gaspra in
October 1991 for scientific observation.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft has concluded its eight-month
survey of the gravitational field of Venus from its elliptical
orbit. On May 25, flight controllers began an 80-day program to
lower and circularize the spacecraft's orbit by aerobraking,
dipping into Venus's upper atmosphere each orbit. Magellan was
launched May 4, 1989 and radar-mapped more than 98 percent of
Venus's surface from September 1990 to September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal,
after several episodes in which it entered contingency mode, a
safe state triggered by the spacecraft computer because of
attitude-reference anomalies. A software fix has solved the
problem. Mars Observer is scheduled to enter Mars orbit August
24, 1993; it will be moved into a mapping orbit by November 8 and
science operations are planned to start November 22. Mars
Observer was launched September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. The mission is mapping ocean circulation.
TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit now
31.7 degrees south relative to the Sun's equator, in transit from
its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar
polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in 1994 and
1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are excellent, with
Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the realm dominated
by the solar wind, a stream of charged particles flowing from the
Sun. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space
Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft have detected low-
frequency radio emissions believed to originate at the boundary
between the solar wind and the interstellar medium, called the
heliopause. Detection and measurement of this boundary is the
principal goal of the Voyager Interstellar Mission. Voyager 1,
launched September 5, 1977, is currently 7.8 billion kilometers
(4.8 billion miles) from the Sun after flying by Jupiter and
Saturn in 1979 and 1980; Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, to
fly by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune
(1989), is now 6 billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles) from the
Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Never laugh at anyone's
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | dreams.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.58 | Sagdeev and robots throughout the solar system | VERGA::KLAES | Life, the Universe, and Everything | Sun Jun 06 1993 15:51 | 216 |
| Article: 64316
From: [email protected] (David B. Mckissock)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Sagdeev: Will the Next Columbus be a Robot?
Date: 4 Jun 1993 11:24 EST
Organization: NASA Lewis Research Center / Cleveland, Ohio
Back on May 25, my wife and I, along with a graduate of the
International Space University, attended a lecture by Dr. Rolad
Sagdeev at the Air & Space Museum. Sagdeev was the science advisor to
Gorbachev, and is currently head the East-West Space Science Center at
the University of Maryland. The title of his lecture was "Will the
Next Columbus be a Robot?" No flames on my butchered spelling of
Russian names, please.
Sagdeev began saying he was both embarrassed and nostalgic.
Embarrassed, due to the size of the crowd, but also nostalgic, as this
was his 2nd largest crowd to speak to, after addressing the Peoples
Deputies Congress.
As a theoretical physicist, he was surprised when, at the age of 40,
he was asked to run the Soviet Space Science Program.
This was the time of the Venus probes, and he described the project as
"very exciting." He explained how he had to report on the results of
the probes to the general public, and each time he got up to explain
one more thing they learned about Venus, the reporters asked about the
US program to other planets, and why the Soviets always sended their
probes to Venus. Sagdeev said he got frustrated at getting asked this
question at each briefing, and on one occasion he answered "Because
they are Sons of a Bitch," and the crowd gave him a standing ovation.
He said he wondered how to diversify the Russian Space Science program
- noting he didn't want to be stuck in a lifelong study of Venus. He
decided to divert the next Venus probe to Halley's comet.
Sagdeev then discussed the "eternal conflict," Man versus robot. He
talked about the Apollo program, and said when Kruschev heard
Kennedy's speech, he was obsessed with early Russian successes.
Sagdeev said they didn't appreciate the significance of the American
Apollo program, and they thought they could compete.
He said the N-1 Booster was built to get cosmonauts to the moon, using
15 or 16 rockets in the first stage. After a few unsuccessful
launches, the last N-1 destroyed the launch facilities (thereby ending
the Russian effort to get men on the moon).
At the same time, a small group was working on unmanned probes to the
moon. They were quite proud of their several dozen unmanned probes. He
noted they had the first satellite on the moon, the first landing,
rovers, and brought back samples of lunar soil from a couple of meters
depth.
In comparing the Russian and NASA lunar programs, he said if you
ignore the emotion, the foot prints, etc., you find the Russians
largely succeeded, as they brought back a few kilo's of samples on
each mission. He noted they did not leave scientific instruments on
the lunar surface, specifically calling out a seismograph, and
something to measure heat flux. He said the Russian scientists were
not given enough of a role in the lunar missions, they were more seen
as a recon mission for manned expeditions. He also noted that
publicly, the Russians stated that they had decided on an un-manned
research program, and he said only the CIA knew better.
Sagdeev said Brezhnev gave a speech indicating the Russian Space
program should focus on manned vehicles. He said the speech was
equivalent to the Reagan State of the Union message where he directed
NASA to build a Space Station. (Aside: I was recently watching a tape
of a PBS show called "The Russian Right Stuff," and they claimed one
of the manned-space advocates inserted some text supporting
manned-space programs into a Brezhnev speech.) This lead to the
development of 7 Salyut stations, and the Mir Space station, which has
been in orbit since 1986.
Sagdeev said that scientists would prefer unmanned spacecraft for LEO
astronomy.
Sagdeev then discussed what it takes to build a robot. He said you had
to equip the robot with 5 senses, just like our senses. Sight is not a
big problem, with a robot's eyes no different than the eye's of a fly.
Hearing produces a small amount of information that is easy to
accommodate. Most robots don't have smell, and he wondered what Viking
would have smelled on Mars. Touch was the first aspect to get it's way
into our terminology, and he cited the word "touch-down" as an
example. Taste and smell are usually combined, and he used the
chemical analysis of soil and atmospheres as an example.
The last aspect of a robot is intellectual capability, and Sagdeev
noted that today's computers are quite sophisticated. He used
computers that play chess as an example, and said some day soon
computers will be able to beat the chess masters.
At this point, there was a fire drill at the Museum, and everybody had
to leave. The lecture restarted about 15 minutes later.
Sagdeev started showing slides from the Halley's comet flight. The
hardest part of the mission was the artificial intelligence needed to
determine how to tell the controller how to identify the nucleus of
the comet. He said they bought a U.S. microprocessor on the black
market via Hungary for the spacecraft, and this was the only part of
the probe built with dollars and not rubles.
He said they considered landing a probe on Phobos, and using a rover
to make a trip around the globe (noting that the rover would need
strict speed control or it would fly off the surface). He showed a
slide from Galileo of Gaspra, noting the similarity with Phobos
(suggesting that Phobos might be an asteroid).
Returning to the robot theme, Sagdeev said the ultimate robot would
have the 5 senses and substantial intellect. He said this isn't a
dream, and could be built with current technology, noting that Freyman
Dyson suggested such a probe. He showed a slide of a mechanical bee,
as an example. He noted that the eyes on a bee have a smaller CCD
density than Hubble and the Mars Observer.
He concluded saying that manned spaceflight is very important. One
needs to maintain the right balance between manned and unmanned
programs. In our lifetime, he said there is no home for man in
interplanetary travels.
The first question from the audience was about UFOs and the 1908
event in Russia. Sagdeev said the 1908 episode was a known event, and
was not due to a UFO. He said one theory was that a celestial body
exploded a couple of km above the surface of the earth, forming a huge
crater. Returning to the UFO part of the question, Sagdeev said if
extra-terrestrial could reach our solar system, he thought they would
probably send robots first.
The next question was on the future of the Russian Space program.
Sagdeev said the economy is declining, and the budget for the space
program is falling rapidly. Interestingly, he noted that there is
general public dissatisfaction with anything that was successful in
the old Soviet Union. He said the space program has no moral support,
and no constituency. For the program to survive the next 3-5 years,
commercial contracts are needed.
He was then asked about a joint US/Russian Mars mission. He responded
that it will occur eventually, and a joint manned mission was the only
solution. He said the current climate is not favorable for this type
of project, however.
Next questioner asked if the Russians considered going to the outer
planets, and what his favorite mission would be. Sagdeev said the idea
of missions to the outer planets was constantly debated. He said he
had no single favorite mission. He like 1/2 a dozen he has seen in the
Discover series, a Mars sample return mission, a Phobos sample return.
Pat then asked if Sagdeev supported a SSTO vehicle, and Sagdeev said
yes, and he completely agrees with Sherzer's calculations of dollars
per pound, although 200 flights per year seems awfully high [just
kidding :)]
The last question was how Russian and US systems could complement each
other in a joint mission. Sagdeev said the Russians have a strong
robotics technology program, and they are good at software. He noted
the expertise in the US in computers and electronics.
Article: 64363
Newsgroups: sci.space
From: [email protected] (Dennis Newkirk)
Subject: Re: Sagdeev: Will the Next Columbus be a Robot?
Organization: Motorola
Date: Fri, 4 Jun 1993 23:42:17 GMT
Sender: [email protected] (Net News)
Thanks for posting this interesting summary, but a few editorial
corrections need to be made in the interest of stopping disinformation.
In article <[email protected]>
[email protected] (David B. Mckissock) writes:
>He said the N-1 Booster was built to get cosmonauts to
>the moon, using 15 or 16 rockets in the first stage.
Really 30 main engines, plus a few roll control thrusters (numbers varied)
>After a few unsuccessful launches,
Four N-1's were launched.
>the last N-1 destroyed the launch facilities (thereby ending the
>Russian effort to get men on the moon).
This is totally untrue, but is a simple answer for an unsuspecting
American audience. While the second and third N-1's did damage both
pads, one was repaired to launch the last (4th) N-1 which failed just
before first staging thus no significant pad damage for the last
flight. Pad damage would not have been a reason to stop the program
anyway. The project was officially stopped in 1974.
>In comparing the Russian and NASA lunar programs, he
>said if you ignore the emotion, the foot prints, etc.,
>you find the Russians largely succeeded, as they
>brought back a few kilo's of samples on each mission.
This is pretty kind, they had their share of failures too, and there
were only a few sample returns.
>Brezhnev speech.) This lead to the development of 7
>Salyut stations, and the Mir Space station,
This is a poor statistic for him to quote. I think these are the
currently accepted figures. There were actually 9 stations launched (2
failed and were not named Salyut, and 1 failed and WAS named Salyut
2). Of this 9, three were Almaz military stations designed by Chelomei
and very different from the familiar civilian Salyut series Designed
by the Korolev Bureau. While the Korolev KB reused Chelomei's Almaz
hull, the power, propulsion and interior systems were very different.
I don't want to seem overly critical of Sagdeev, he is trying his best
to answer questions people want to know about.
Dennis Newkirk ([email protected])
Motorola, Land Mobile Products Sector
Schaumburg, IL
|
| 550.59 | Planetary Missions Status -- 29 Jun 93 | CXDOCS::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Fri Jul 02 1993 11:23 | 80 |
|
Forwarded from:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
June 29, 1993
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now en route to Jupiter, scheduled to
enter orbit December 7, 1995. Galileo will also fly by asteroid
Ida, at 2400 kilometers, on August 28, 1993. The spacecraft's
performance and condition are excellent except that the high-gain
antenna is only partly deployed; science and engineering data are
being transmitted via the low-gain antenna, which the mission
team is planning to use for the Jupiter mission and the Ida
encounter. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus
in 1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew
by asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 for scientific observation.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The Magellan spacecraft controllers are conducting an
aerobraking program, begun May 25, to lower and circularize the
spacecraft's orbit, permitting higher-resolution global gravity
mapping. In this 80-day innovative procedure, the spacecraft
dips into Venus's upper atmosphere each orbit, slowing and
shortening the orbit without expending fuel. Magellan was
launched May 4, 1989. It radar-mapped more than 98 percent of
Venus's surface from September 1990 to September 1992, and
surveyed parts of the gravitational field from its elliptical
orbit for the next 8 months.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: Spacecraft health and performance are normal.
Mars Observer is scheduled to enter Mars orbit August 24, 1993;
it will be maneuvered into a mapping orbit by November 8 and
science operations are planned to start November 24. Mars
Observer was launched September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. The mission is mapping global sea level
changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling and winds. So
far it has accumulated 6 months of data. TOPEX/Poseidon was
launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
more than 33 degrees south relative to the Sun's equator, in
transit from its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward
its solar polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in
1994 and 1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are
excellent, with Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the
realm dominated by the solar wind, a stream of charged particles
flowing from the Sun. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the
European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
Interstellar Mission, having remotely detected the heliopause,
the boundary between the solar magnetosphere and interstellar
space, for the first time last month. Voyager 1, launched
September 5, 1977, is currently 7.9 billion kilometers (4.9
billion miles) from the Sun after flying by Jupiter and Saturn in
1979 and 1980; Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, to fly by
Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989),
is now 6 billion kilometers (3.8 billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't outlive your money.
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 |
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.60 | JPL Planetary Missions Status Reports - 07/29/93 | CXDOCS::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon Aug 02 1993 16:27 | 81 |
|
Forwarded from:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
July 29, 1993
GALILEO: The spacecraft is now one month from its encounter with
asteroid Ida, at 2400 kilometers, on August 28, 1993. Scientific
observations will be recorded for later playback. Galileo will go
into Jupiter orbit and operate a probe in its atmosphere on
December 7, 1995. Spacecraft condition is excellent, except that
the high-gain antenna is still only partly deployed; science and
engineering data are being transmitted via the low-gain antenna,
which the mission team is planning to use for the Jupiter
mission. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in
1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by
asteroid Gaspra in October 1991.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The aerobraking program, begun May 25, is expected to
be complete in early August, putting the spacecraft in a lower
and more circular orbit for higher-resolution gravity mapping of
higher latitudes and the poles. This procedure, dipping into
Venus's upper atmosphere each orbit, has produced new knowledge
of the atmospheric properties. Magellan was launched May 4,
1989. It radar-mapped more than 98 percent of Venus's surface
from September 1990 to September 1992, and surveyed parts of the
gravitational field from its elliptical orbit for the next 8
months.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: The spacecraft, currently 5.5 million kilometers
(3.4 million miles) from Mars, is being prepared to enter orbit
on August 24. Spacecraft health and performance are normal. It
will then be maneuvered into a mapping orbit; science operations
are planned to start in mid-December. Mars Observer was launched
September 25, 1992.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally, typically providing three
playbacks per day. The mission is mapping global sea level
changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling and winds. So
far it has accumulated 7 months of data. TOPEX/Poseidon was
launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
nearly 36 degrees south relative to the Sun's equator, in transit
from its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar
polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in 1994 and
1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are excellent, with
Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the realm dominated
by the solar wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the
European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
Interstellar Mission, having remotely detected the heliopause,
the boundary between the solar magnetosphere and interstellar
space, for the first time last month. Voyager 1, launched
September 5, 1977, is currently 8 billion kilometers (5 billion
miles) from the Sun after flying by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979
and 1980; Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, to fly by Jupiter
(1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989), is now
more than 6 billion kilometers (3.9 billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Common sense is not very
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | common.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.61 | Interview on Discovery and CASSINI planetary missions | VERGA::KLAES | Quo vadimus? | Wed Aug 18 1993 12:54 | 100 |
| From: US1RMC::"[email protected]" "Ron Baalke" 17-AUG-1993
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Huntress Interview
From Space News, p. 22
August 16-22, 1993
Interview with Wesley Huntress,
Associate Administrator NASA Office of Space Science
This is extracted portions of the interview about the Discovery Missions and
Cassini.
Q: The House of Representatives has approved funding for your office to
begin the Discovery line of low-cost planetary missions in 1994. How
politically viable is this program?
A: It is very high priority because it was sent to the Congress by the
White House after the space station redesign. There is a lot of
support for it in the Congress and the administration.
Q: What cost requirements must proposals meet to qualify for Discovery funding?
A: The development cost must be no more than $150 million in 1992 dollars.
Q: Does that include launch costs?
A: No, but they must use a Delta 2 launch vehicle or smaller. The development
must be completed within 36 months or less. These are pretty confining
restraints for a planetary mission.
Q: Does the Delta 2 requirement limit you to the inner solar system [Mercury,
Venus, Earth and Mars]?
A: Pretty much. But in fact, the cost also limits you. The outer solar
system is very difficult to do under these contraints.
Q: How many Discovery mission will there be?
A: The House voted to provide $63 million for development, and there is some
money also in there for a launch vehicle. At that level of funding, we
could do one mission every other year. We would have liked to do one a
year.
Q: What mission will be first?
A: The Mars Environmental Survey (MESUR) Pathfinder mission. We had proposed
to do both MESUR and the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous.
Q: Why was the Mars lander mission selected first?
A: The reason is strictly celestial mechanics. Mars only comes into position
for a launch every 26 months. And there is a launch opportunity in
November 1996. To get to that opportunity, we would have to start in 1994.
For a Near Earth Asteroid, there is essentially one every year.
Q: How will you select future Discovery missions?
A: After the two we use to anchor the program, we are going to ask for what
I call science buys. We are going to ask for an investigator to come
forward with a science mission in total, allied with industry and a
NASA center, if that's appropriate. The team will develop and conduct
the entire mission. This gives much more opportunity for the university
scientists and industry. There would be a manager here, and there would
be some NASA oversight. But one of the ideas here it to put more
responsibility and accountability with the individual who is in charge
of the project.
Q: The Jet Propulsion Lab is assembling your next major spacecraft, Cassini.
How is that project going?
A: Since the restructuring of Cassini and the establishment of stable funding,
the project has been going very well. Recently, the Italian government
agreed to give funding to the Italian contractors building the radio
subsystem and antenna for Cassini. We are driven by the schedule to
make the October 1997 launch date, so to get approval from the Italian
government to fund the contract at this time is important.
Q: Are you worried about the recent failure of a Titan 4, sine you will need
that launcher for Cassini?
A: I have to be concerned if they have a failure. We have had failures with
launch vehicles before; you go find what's wrong with them, you fix them
and they work. The Atlas is a recent example. We are in a risky business,
and you have to accept a certain amount of risk.
Q: Will you have to shut down any spacecraft to meet the budget?
A: The House of Representatives voted to add $22.5 million to the amount
the Clinton administration requested; if we get that, we won't have to
turn anything off.
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | The hardest thing to learn
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | in life is which bridge to
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | cross and which to burn.
|
| 550.62 | Planetary Missions Status Report -- 09/01/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Fri Sep 03 1993 10:19 | 82 |
|
Forwarded from:
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
September 1, 1993
GALILEO: The encounter with asteroid Ida was successfully
completed on August 28, 1993. Scientific observations were
recorded; preliminary analysis has verified the presence of an
Ida image on tape. The playback opportunity at 40 bits per
second will continue until late September and then resume in the
spring of 1994. Galileo will go into Jupiter orbit and operate a
probe in its atmosphere on December 7, 1995. Spacecraft
condition is excellent, except that the high-gain antenna is
still only partly deployed; the mission team is planning to use
the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter mission. Galileo was
launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in
1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by asteroid Gaspra in
October 1991.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The spacecraft is now in a gravity-mapping orbit, with
altitudes of 197 to 541 km (122 to 336 miles) from the surface of
Venus. This orbit was achieved by aerobraking, an experimental
operation carried out between May and August. Magellan's
condition is very good, and precision tracking is providing
desired data on the gravitational field. Magellan was launched
May 4, 1989. It radar-mapped more than 98 percent of Venus's
surface from September 1990 to September 1992, and surveyed parts
of the gravitational field from its elliptical orbit for the next
8 months.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
MARS OBSERVER: The spacecraft's location and condition are not
known. On Saturday, August 21, the spacecraft signal was not
reacquired after a planned transmitter shutdown, part of the
sequence for going into Mars orbit. Commands to the spacecraft
have produced no response. Mars Observer was launched September
25, 1992, and was scheduled to enter Mars orbit on August 24.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally. The mission is mapping
global sea level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling
and winds. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
about 38 degrees south relative to the Sun's equator, in transit
from its Jupiter gravity assist in February 1992 toward its solar
polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in 1994 and
1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are excellent, with
Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the realm dominated
by the solar wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the
European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
Interstellar Mission, having remotely detected the heliopause,
the boundary between the solar magnetosphere and interstellar
space, for the first time recently. Voyager 1, launched
September 5, 1977, is currently 8 billion kilometers (5 billion
miles) from the Sun after flying by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979
and 1980; Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, to fly by Jupiter
(1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989), is now
more than 6 billion kilometers (3.9 billion miles) from the Sun.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
#####
___ _____ ___
/_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | [email protected]
| | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab |
___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Nobody notices when things
/___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | go right.
|_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ |
|
| 550.63 | Planetary Missions Status -- 11/30/93 | PONIL::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Wed Dec 01 1993 14:15 | 65 |
|
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
November 30, 1993
GALILEO: The spacecraft has passed solar conjunction, and is
almost 670 million kilometers (415 million miles) from Earth;
because of its distance, the spacecraft now transmits at a data
rate of 10 bits per second. Playback of data from Galileo's
encounter with the asteroid Ida, begun last September, will
resume in spring 1994 at 40 bits per second when the spacecraft
is closer to Earth for a few months. Galileo will go into orbit
around Jupiter and relay data from a probe in its atmosphere on
December 7, 1995. Spacecraft condition is excellent, except that
the high-gain antenna is still only partly deployed; the mission
team is planning to use the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter
mission. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in
1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by
the asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 and Ida in August 1993.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The spacecraft is in a gravity-mapping orbit around
Venus with altitudes of 197 to 541 kilometers (122 to 336 miles),
and has mapped about a third of the planet's gravitational field
through precision tracking since the orbit was achieved through
aerobraking earlier this year. Spacecraft condition is very
good. Magellan was launched May 4, 1989. It radar-mapped more
than 98 percent of Venus's surface from September 1990 to
September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally. The mission is to map
global sea level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling
and winds. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
more than 45 degrees south relative to the sun's equator and
about 630 million kilometers (390 million miles) from Earth,
following a gravity assist flyby at Jupiter in February 1992.
The spacecraft will make solar polar passages (about 80 degrees
south and north) in 1994 and 1995. Spacecraft condition and
performance are excellent, with Ulysses gathering data on the
heliosphere -- the realm dominated by the solar wind. The
Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space Agency and
launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
interstellar mission, currently taking data on magnetic fields
and charged particles as well as ultraviolet data. Voyager 1,
launched September 5, 1977, is currently 8.22 billion kilometers
(5.11 billion miles) from Earth after flying by Jupiter and
Saturn in 1979 and 1980. Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977,
flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune
(1989), and is now 6.34 billion kilometers (3.94 billion miles)
from Earth.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
|
| 550.64 | Planetary Missions Status -- 01/03/94 | CXDOCS::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Wed Jan 05 1994 09:44 | 65 |
|
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
January 3, 1994
GALILEO: The spacecraft and Earth are once again approaching
each other, although Galileo continues to recede from the Sun on
its way to Jupiter. The distances are 654 million kilometers
(406 million miles) from Earth, 560 million kilometers (348
million miles) from the Sun. Distance to Earth will reach a
minimum in early May and then start to increase. Playback of
data from Galileo's encounter with the asteroid Ida, begun last
September, will resume in spring 1994 at 40 bits per second (the
rate is now 10 bits per second). Galileo will go into orbit
around Jupiter and relay data from a probe in its atmosphere on
December 7, 1995. Spacecraft condition is excellent, except that
the high-gain antenna is still only partly deployed; the mission
team is planning to use the low-gain antenna for the Jupiter
mission. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus in
1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by
the asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 and Ida in August 1993.
Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The spacecraft is in orbit around Venus with altitudes
of 197 to 541 kilometers (122 to 336 miles), and has been mapping
the planet's gravitational field through precision tracking since
the orbit was achieved through aerobraking earlier this year.
Spacecraft condition is very good. Magellan was launched May 4,
1989. It radar-mapped more than 98 percent of Venus's surface
from September 1990 to September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally. The mission is to map
global sea level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling
and winds. TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now
almost 49 degrees south relative to the sun's equator and about
543 million kilometers (337 million miles) from Earth, following
a gravity assist flyby at Jupiter in February 1992. Ulysses will
make solar polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in
1994 and 1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are
excellent, with Ulysses gathering data on the heliosphere -- the
realm dominated by the solar wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was
built by the European Space Agency and launched October 6, 1990.
Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
interstellar mission, currently taking data on magnetic fields
and charged particles as well as ultraviolet data. Voyager 1,
launched September 5, 1977, is currently 8.25 billion kilometers
(5.13 billion miles) from Earth after flying by Jupiter and
Saturn in 1979 and 1980. Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977,
flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune
(1989), and is now 6.41 billion kilometers (3.98 billion miles)
from Earth.
Contact: Mary Hardin, (818) 354-5011.
|
| 550.65 | Planetary Missions Status -- 01/31/94 | CXDOCS::J_BUTLER | E pur, si muove... | Mon Feb 07 1994 11:27 | 49 |
|
Date: Thu Feb 3 13:12:00 1994
Subject: Planetary Mission Status, January 31, 1994
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS January 31, 1994
GALILEO: The spacecraft is 620 million kilometers (385 million miles)
from the Sun. Galileo will go into orbit around Jupiter and relay data
from a probe in its atmosphere on December 7, 1995. Spacecraft
condition is excellent, except that the high-gain antenna is still
only partly deployed; the mission team is planning to use the low-gain
antenna for the Jupiter mission. Galileo was launched October 18,
1989, flew by Venus in 1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity
assists, and flew by the asteroid Gaspra in October 1991 and Ida in
August 1993. Contact: Jim Wilson, (818) 354-5011.
MAGELLAN: The spacecraft is in orbit around Venus with altitudes of 197
to 541 kilometers (122 to 336 miles), and has been mapping the planet's
gravitational field through precision tracking since this orbit was
achieved through aerobraking in mid-1993. The spacecraft's condition is
very good. Magellan was launched May 4, 1989. It radar-mapped more than
98 percent of Venus's surface from September 1990 to September 1992.
Contact: Jim Doyle, (818) 354-5011.
TOPEX/POSEIDON: The satellite is healthy, and all scientific
instruments are performing normally. The mission is to map global sea
level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling and winds.
TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992. Contact: Mary Hardin,
(818) 354-5011.
ULYSSES: The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now about
51 degrees south relative to the solar equator, and about 550 million
kilometers (340 million miles) from the Sun. Ulysses will make solar
polar passages (about 80 degrees south and north) in 1994 and 1995.
Spacecraft condition and performance are excellent, with Ulysses
gathering data on the heliosphere -- the realm dominated by the solar
wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space Agency and
launched October 6, 1990. Contact: Diane Ainsworth, (818) 354-5011.
VOYAGER 1 and 2: The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their
interstellar mission, currently taking data on magnetic fields and
charged particles as well as ultraviolet data. Voyager 1, launched
September 5, 1977, is currently 8.2 billion kilometers (5.1 billion
miles) from the Sun after flying by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and
1980. Voyager 2, launched August 20, 1977, flew by Jupiter (1979),
Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989), and is now 6.3 billion
kilometers (3.9 billion miles) from the Sun. Contact: Mary Hardin,
(818) 354-5011.
|
| 550.66 | Planetary missions get a boost | VERGA::KLAES | Quo vadimus? | Tue Feb 15 1994 17:58 | 142 |
| From: US1RMC::"[email protected]" "MAIL-11 Daemon" 15-FEB-1994 17:55:11.47
CC:
Subj: fyi#21_distr
NASA FY95 Budget Request: Space Science
FYI No. 21, February 15, 1994
CORRECTION: FYI #18 stated that the Space Science budget would
increase from 22.4% of the total NASA budget to 24.3% under the
fiscal year 1995 request. These percentages apply to the total of
NASA's science programs, not Space Science alone.
The Space Science budget would receive an increase of $44.1 million
(2.6%), bringing it to $1,766.0 million, or 12.4% of the total NASA
budget. Of this amount, Physics and Astronomy would receive
$1,058.7 million (down $8.9 million), while Planetary Exploration
would receive $707.3 million (up $53.0 million). Selected
highlights from NASA's background material for the FY95 space
science budget are quoted below:
CASSINI: "The Cassini mission to Saturn has made great progress
towards launch scheduled for 1997 following recent program and
spacecraft restructuring to reduce costs and improve mass and
schedule margins. The $255 million [down $11.6 million] being
requested for FY 1995 will support all remaining Critical Design
Reviews (CDR), spacecraft integration, instrument integration and
testing and initiation of environmental testing. ... The Cassini
mission, including the European Space Agency-provided Huygens
probe, will investigate whether the icy moons have preserved a
record of the formation of the early solar system as well as
determine whether the necessary building blocks of the chemical
evolution of life exist beyond Earth. The mission also will
provide insight into why the large, gaseous outer planets have
evolved much differently than the inner solar system bodies."
AXAF: "The Advanced Astrophysics Facility (AXAF) program will
enter a critical year of development starting in FY 1995. The
funding request of $234.3 million [down $7.0 million] will support
the Observatory Preliminary Design Review in November 1994, a
Critical Design Audit of the optical bench assembly, delivery of
all flight mirrors and initial mirror coating, and all instrument
CDRs scheduled for completion during the fiscal year. AXAF will
study the composition and nature of galaxies, stellar objects and
interstellar phenomena as well as basic issues in theoretical
physics. (The AXAF-Spectroscopy mission was terminated in FY 1994
as a result of Congressional action.)"
RELATIVITY MISSION: "A major test of Einstein's general theory of
relativity, which could have profound implications on science's
understanding of the nature of the Universe, is the focus of the
Relativity Mission. The schedule and internal funding allocation
for the Gravity Probe-B and the Shuttle Test of Relativity
experiment (STORE) program are being reevaluated in an effort to
maintain a Gravity Probe-B launch date before the year 2000. The
program request for FY 1995 is $50 million."
GLOBAL GEOSPACE SCIENCE PROGRAM: "...No FY 1995 funding for GGS
development has been requested at this time, pending the results
from an ongoing program review."
DISCOVERY PROGRAM: "NASA's need for more frequent planetary
missions embodying low-cost and quick design-to-flight is answered
by the Discovery program. For FY 1995, $129.7 million has been
requested. Two Discovery missions, initiated in FY 1994, are under
development: The Mars Environmental Survey (MESUR) Pathfinder and
the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR). The Pathfinder mission,
scheduled for a 1996 launch, is designed to demonstrate the
technology, systems and mission design involved in landing a series
of small surface stations and rovers on Mars. The FY 1995 funding
request of $77.5 million supports final fabrication and assembly of
spacecraft and instrument subsystems, all hardware deliveries and
initiation of system level integration and testing at JPL.... NEAR
will fly by a main belt asteroid following its 1996 launch before
its rendezvous with the near-Earth asteroid Eros in 1998. The
spacecraft will study Eros for a year. The FY 1995 funding request
of $52.2 million supports completion of detailed design activities,
fabrication of spacecraft and instrument subsystems with subsystem
level testing conducted in parallel."
MARS SURVEYOR: "One of the most important new activities for FY
1995 is the beginning of development of a new Mars Exploration
strategy. Called the Mars Surveyor program, it consists of an
orbiter and a series of small missions designed to resume the
detailed exploration of Mars. The orbiter will fly a small science
payload aboard a small industry-developed spacecraft. Following
the orbiter will be a series of small communications orbiters and
landers to make surface measurements of Martian climate and soil
composition. Scheduled for a 1996 launch, the orbiter is designed
to capture much of the data that would have been obtained by the
Mars Observer. The FY 1995 budget request calls for $78.4 million
to support initial instrument and spacecraft subsystem level
fabrication and assembly, ground system hardware procurement and
software development...."
EXPLORER PROGRAM: "Three Explorer missions are currently under
development. Explorer investigations typically have highly
specific objectives which do not require the capabilities of a
major observatory. For FY 1995, $120.4 million has been requested
to continue the development activities, including spacecraft and
instrument integration for the X-Ray Timing Explorer (XTE);
hardware fabrication and assembly of the Advanced Composition
Explorer (ACE); and final development activities and launch
preparations for the Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite
(SWAS).... "
MISSION OPERATIONS AND DATA ANALYSIS (MO&DA): "MO&DA funds are
used to support the prime missions of science spacecraft and
ongoing analysis of selected mission data sets. For FY 1995,
$569.4 million is requested.
"In Planetary exploration, the Galileo operations and multimission
support for other planetary missions will amount to $127.7 million
[down $14.0 million].
"In Physics and Astronomy, the requested funds of $441.7 million
[up $21.0 million] will support continuing operations and data
analysis of the Hubble Space Telescope, Compton Gamma Ray
Observatory, Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer, International
Ultraviolet Explorer, ROSAT, the Astro-D/ASCA missions, Pioneers 10
& 11, Voyagers 1 & 2, Ulysses, IMP-8, Geotail, SAMPEX and Yohkoh
missions. The MO&DA funds also will support planning and
development of instruments for future servicing missions and other
critical components for the Hubble Space Telescope..."
[Additionally, RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS (R&A) funding for both
components of the Space Science budget would remain level; with
Physics and Astronomy receiving $71.1 million, and Planetary
Exploration receiving $115.1 million.]
###############
Public Information Division
American Institute of Physics
Contact: Audrey T. Leath
(301) 209-3094
##END##########
% ====== Internet headers and postmarks (see DECWRL::GATEWAY.DOC) ======
% Date: Tue, 15 Feb 94 17:11:20 EST
% From: [email protected]
% Subject: fyi#21_distr
|
| 550.67 | Lunar Impact/Landing Sites | VERGA::KLAES | Quo vadimus? | Tue Mar 01 1994 16:56 | 131 |
| Article: 911
From: [email protected] (Tim Harincar)
Newsgroups: sci.space.tech
Subject: Table of Lunar Impact/Landing Sites
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 1994 17:36:22 GMT
Organization: U of Minnesota
Sender: -Not-Authenticated-[7885]@news3.cis.umn.edu
With Clementine in mapping orbit, I thought I'd post a list of
landing, impact and crash sites of artificial objects that I have
compiled. I haven't been able to locate a reference for the Apollo 16
LM, so if any knows that, or has any other corrections, let me know.
Lunar Exploration Landing,
Impact, or Crash Sites
The distinction between "impact" and "crash":
Impact refers to a high speed impact of the craft, resulting in the
destruction of the craft and no further data returned from the craft.
The grounding, however, was intentional and under the direction of
ground controllers.
A crash, however, is the result of an out of control or contact craft
crashing into the surface.
Mission Coords
------------ -----------------------------------
United States
Ranger 4........ 15.5!S, 130.5!W (Crash)
Ranger 6........ 9.39!N, 21.51!E (Crash)
Ranger 7........ 10.7!S, 20.7!W (Impact)
Ranger 8........ 2.59!N, 24.77!E (Impact)
Ranger 9........ 13.3!S, 3.0!W (Impact)
Surveyor 1...... 2.45!S, 43.22!W (Landing)
Surveyor 2...... 5.5!N, 12.0!W (Crash)
Surveyor 3...... 2.97!N, 23.34!W (Landing)
Surveyor 4...... 0.4!N, 1.33!W (Crash)
Surveyor 5...... 1.5!N, 23.19!E (Landing)
Surveyor 6...... 0.53!N, 1.4!W (Landing)
Surveyor 7......40.86!S, 11.47!W (Landing)
Lunar Orbiter1.. 6.7!N, 162!E (Impact)
Lunar Orbiter2.. 4!S, 98!E (Impact)
Lunar Orbiter3.. 14.6!N, 91.7!W (Impact)
Lunar Orbiter4..Unknown (Crash)
Lunar Orbiter5.. 0.0!N, 70!W (Impact)
Apollo 10
LM Descent..Unknown (Crash)
Apollo 11
Landing..... 1.12!N, 23.81!E (Landing)
LM..........Unknown (Crash)
Apollo 12
Landing..... 3.20!N, 23.34!W (Landing)
LM.......... 3.94!S, 21.20!W (Impact)
Apollo 13
SIVB........ 2.75!S, 27.86!W (Impact)
Apollo 14
SIVB........ 8.09!S, 26.02!W (Impact)
Landing..... 3.66!S, 17.46!W (Landing)
LM.......... 3.42!S, 19.67!W (Impact)
Apollo 15
SIVB........ 1.51!N, 11.81!W (Impact)
Landing.....26.10!N, 3.65!E (Landing)
LM..........26.36!N, 0.25!W (Impact)
F&P SubSat..Unknown (Crash)
Apollo 16
SIVB........ 1.3!N 10.7!, 23.8!W 10.2! (Impact)
Landing..... 8.60!S, 15.51!E (Landing)
LM..........
F&P Subsat.. 10.2!N, 112!E (Impact)
Apollo 17
SIVB........ 4.21!S, 12.31!W (Impact)
Landing.....20.16!N, 30.76!E (Landing)
LM..........19.96!N, 30.50!E (Impact)
Soviet Union
LUNA 2.......... 30!N, 0!W (Impact)
LUNA 5.......... 31!S, 8!W (Crash)
LUNA 7.......... 9!N, 49!W (Crash)
LUNA 8.......... 9.12!N, 60.30!W (Crash)
LUNA 9.......... 7.13!N, 64.37!W (Landing)
LUNA 13.........18.57!N, 60.00!W (Landing)
LUNA 15......... 17!N, 60!E (Crash)
LUNA 16......... 0.68!N, 56.30!E (Landing)
LUNA 17.........38.28!N, 35!W (Landing)
LUNA 18......... 3.57!N, 56.5!E (Crash)
LUNA 20......... 3.53!N, 56.55!E (Landing)
LUNA 21.........25.85!N, 30.45!E (Landing)
LUNA 23......... 13!N, 62!E (Landing)
LUNA 24.........12.75!N, 62.20!E (Landing)
--
tim harincar "God I need more money..."
[email protected] - Bob Weirsbe, while watching a demo
of the Apogee/Aerotech D3 at NSL 94
Article: 932
From: [email protected] (Tim Harincar)
Newsgroups: sci.space.tech
Subject: Re: Table of Lunar Impact/Landing Sites
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 1994 15:33:03 GMT
Organization: U of Minnesota
Sender: -Not-Authenticated-[7885]@news3.cis.umn.edu
In article <[email protected]>
[email protected] (Tim Harincar) writes:
> Apollo 16
> SIVB........ 1.3!N 10.7!, 23.8!W 10.2! (Impact)
Since my editor filtered the special symbols, this should read
1.3!N +-0.7!, 23.8!W +-0.2!
where the '!' is a degree symbol. The editor replace the '+-' symbol
with a '1'. BTW, the error is a result of ground controllers losing
telemetry from the stage shortly before impact.
--
tim harincar "God I need more money..."
[email protected] - Bob Weirsbe, while watching a demo
of the Apogee/Aerotech D3 at NSL 94
|
| 550.68 | March 29 | JVERNE::KLAES | Be Here Now | Fri Apr 01 1994 10:25 | 72 |
| Date: Thu, 31 Mar 1994 09:34:12 +0500 (EST)
From: Jim Brown <[email protected]>
To: Planetarian's Digest <[email protected]>
Subject: Planetary Mission Status March 29 1994
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Planetary Mission Status, March 29, 1994
PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109.
PLANETARY MISSION STATUS
March 29, 1994
GALILEO
The spacecraft is playing back data collected during the flyby of
asteroid Ida in August 1993 at 40 bits per second. An image and other
data released March 23 show a small moon orbiting the asteroid, the
first confirmed natural satellite of an asteroid. Galileo is 528
million kilometers (328 million miles) from Earth and 622 million
kilometers from the Sun. It will go into orbit around Jupiter and
relay data from a probe that will descend into the giant planet's
atmosphere on December 7, 1995. Spacecraft condition is excellent,
except that the high-gain antenna is still only partly deployed; the
low-gain antenna is supporting communications, as it will for the
Jupiter mission. Galileo was launched October 18, 1989, flew by Venus
in 1990 and Earth in 1990 and 1992 for gravity assists, and flew by
the asteroids Gaspra in October 1991 and Ida last August.
MAGELLAN
The spacecraft is in orbit around Venus with altitudes of 197 to 541
kilometers (122 to 336 miles), mapping the planet's gravitational
field through precision tracking; this is scheduled to continue
through September 1994. The spacecraft's condition is very good.
Magellan was launched May 4, 1989. It radar-mapped more than 98
percent of Venus' surface from September 1990 to September 1992.
TOPEX/POSEIDON
The satellite is healthy, and the scientific instruments are
collecting scientific data on schedule. The mission is to map global
sea level changes, reflecting seasonal warming and cooling and winds.
TOPEX/Poseidon was launched August 10, 1992.
ULYSSES
The spacecraft is in a highly inclined solar orbit, now 57.6 degrees
south relative to the solar equator, and about 506 million kilometers
(313 million miles) from the Sun. Ulysses will pass more than 70
degrees south June 27 and reach 80 degrees south on September 14,
1994. The northern polar passage will take place in June to September
1995. Spacecraft condition and performance are excellent. Ulysses is
gathering data on the heliosphere -- the realm dominated by the solar
wind. The Ulysses spacecraft was built by the European Space Agency
and was launched October 6, 1990.
VOYAGER 1 and 2
The two Voyager spacecraft are continuing their interstellar mission,
taking data on magnetic fields and charged particles as well as
ultraviolet data. Voyager 1, launched September 5, 1977, is currently
8.28 billion kilometers (5.14 billion miles) from the sun after flying
by Jupiter and Saturn in 1979 and 1980. Voyager 2 was launched August
20, 1977, and flew by Jupiter (1979), Saturn (1981), Uranus (1986) and
Neptune (1989); it is now 6.36 billion kilometers (3.96 billion miles)
from the Sun.
|
| 550.69 | James Pollack, Planet Explorer | MTWAIN::KLAES | Keep Looking Up | Wed Jun 15 1994 23:53 | 56 |
| Article: 61293
Newsgroups: sci.astro
From: [email protected] (Kendall Willets)
Subject: James Pollack Obituary
Organization: HoloNet National Internet Access System: 510-704-1058/modem
Date: Thu, 16 Jun 1994 00:04:01 GMT
This appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle Obits today, apologies
for not typing all of it, but it was rather long as obits go:
JAMES POLLACK - HE EXPLORED SOLAR SYSTEM
By David Perlman
Chronicle Science Editor
James B. Pollack, an astronomer at the Ames Research Center who used
America's fleet of unmanned spacecraft to explore the atmospheres of
virtually all the solar system's planets, died at his home in San Jose
on Monday after a long battle with cancer. He was 56.
Renowned for his discoveries of weather effects on Mars, of sulfuric
acid in the clouds of Venus, of ice chunks in the rings of Saturn and
of the gases of Jupiter, Mr. Pollack was planning future missions to
these planets when his illness felled him.
In an entirely different role, Mr. Pollack conducted research into
Earth's atmosphere that led him to a partnership with astronomer Carl
Sagan and three other scientists who collaborated in 1983 and 1990 to
produce two major studies on the catastrophic effects of an all-out
war between the United States and the Soviet Union.
....[more info on nuclear winter]...
Mr. Pollack's first mission in space exploration came in 1967 when he
joined a scientific team analyzing images from the Mariner 9 spacecraft
that orbited Mars. [Mariner 9 was actually launched in 1971. - LK]
He was then a physicist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
in Cambridge, Mass.
After a stint at Cornell University, Mr. Pollack became a resident
scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View (CA), the
post he held until his death. While at Ames he played major roles in
NASA's most successful space ventures, including the Viking landins on
Mars, the Pioneer mission to Venus, the Galileo probe to Jupiter, the
Cassini mission to Saturn and the spectacular Voyager "Grand Tour" of
the solar system.
....
His creativity won him many major awards, including several NASA
medals for scientific achievement; the Gerard P. Kuiper prize of the
American Astronomical Society for "excellent and enduring
contributions to planetary science," and the Leo Szilard Award of the
American Physical Society for his research in the "public interest."
....
|
| 550.70 | Planetary Maps FAQ | MTWAIN::KLAES | No Guts, No Galaxy | Thu Aug 04 1994 11:38 | 144 |
| Article: 66069
From: [email protected]
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: update: planetary map FAQ
Date: 26 Jul 94 10:49:24 EDT
Organization: Social Science Computing Laboratory
This is the latest version of my Planetary Map FAQ file:
PLANETARY MAPS: (this article is in the public domain)
A list of maps of all mapped solid bodies except Earth, 47 by July 1994.
If there are many maps (e.g. Mars) a good general purpose global map is
given, subdivided if necessary: relief maps (usually with placenames),
topography (contours), geological maps... If not (e.g. Deimos) the best
available map is listed. Some (e.g. Comet Encke) are simple diagrams of
possible surface features ('sketch' under map type). A few interesting
books are listed at the end. Errors or omissions: please contact the
author (Phil Stooke) at: [email protected].
References: USGS = U.S. Geological Survey. Order by I-number from USGS
Map Sales, Box 25286, Denver, Colorado USA 80225. About $3 / sheet (some
in list are sets of several sheets). Check before ordering. NASA Tech.
Memo. 4395 (Indexes of Maps of Planets and Satellites 1992) by J. Inge and
R. Batson is the best guide to sheet maps. Most Apollo-era Moon maps (LAC,
LTO) are out of print, but some (+ NASA CD-ROMS) may be found at NSSDC:
National Space Science Data Center, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt,
Maryland USA 20771. Edmund Scientific: 101 E.Gloucester Pike, Barrington,
NJ 08007-1380, USA. Other maps are in books and journals. Bibliographic
data are abbreviated but there should be enough detail to find the item.
I will answer questions about planetary maps at the e-mail address above.
BODY MAP TYPE REFERENCE
Mercury relief USGS maps I-1149,1171,1822
geology USGS maps I-1199,1233,1408,1409,1658,1659,1660,
2015,2148
atlas Davies et al. ATLAS OF MERCURY, NASA SP-423, 1978
globe USGS (out of print- see at Cornell U. or LPI)
Venus relief USGS map I-2041 (Venera 15/16 data)
topogr USGS map I-1324,1562 (Pioneer Venus), I-2041
+ GxDR CD-ROM (Magellan) available from NSSDC
geology USGS map I-2059 (Venera 15/16 data)
atlas ATLAS POVERKHNOSTI VENERY, Russia, 1989
globe USGS (out of print - see at Cornell U. or LPI)
Moon relief USGS maps I-1218,1326,2276
topogr NSSDC: LAC maps (earthside), LTO maps (Apollo zone)
geology USGS maps I-703,948,1034,1047,1062,1162,
+ Wilhelms, USGS Professional Paper 1348, 1987
atlas LUNAR ORBITER PHOTO ATLAS, NASA SP-206, 1971
+ A. Rukl, ATLAS OF THE MOON, Hamlyn, 1990
globe Replogle Globes (via Sky Publ., ads in SKY+TEL.)
Mars relief USGS maps I-1618,2179, Edmund Scientific Mars Map
topogr USGS map I-2160 + MDIM CD-ROM, disk 7, from NSSDC
geology USGS map I-1802
digital MDIM CD-ROMs, disks 1-6, available from NSSDC
atlas Batson et al., ATLAS OF MARS, NASA SP-438, 1979
globe Sky Publishing (ads in SKY+TELESCOPE)
Phobos outline Thomas, ICARUS, 40: 223-243, 1979
relief Bugaevsky et al., ADV.SPACE.RES. 12(9):17-21, 1992
topogr Thomas, ICARUS, 105:326-344, 1993
globe Max Planck Institut fur Physik+Astrophys., 1988
Deimos outline Thomas, ICARUS, 40: 223-243, 1979
relief Stooke, SKY+TELESCOPE 69:551-553, 1985
topogr Thomas, ICARUS, 105:326-344, 1993
Amalthea sketch Veverka et al., J.GEOPHYS.RES. 86:8675-8692, 1981
rel,topo Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS 56:123-139, 1992
Io relief USGS map I-1713
topogr Gaskell+Synnott,GEOPHYS.RES.LET. 15:581-584, 1988
geology USGS map I-2209
Europa relief USGS maps I-1241,1493,1499
geology SATELLITES OF JUPITER,Ch.14, U.Arizona Press, 1982
Ganymede relief USGS map I-2331
geology USGS maps I-1934,1966,2289 (more sheets to come)
Callisto relief USGS maps I-1239,2035
Prometheus rel,topo Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS, 62: 199-221, 1993
Pandora rel,topo Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS, 62: 199-221, 1993
Janus rel,topo Stooke+Lumsdon, EARTH,MOON,PLAN. 62: 223-237, 1993
Epimetheus rel,topo Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS, 63: 67-83, 1993
Mimas relief USGS maps I-1489,2155
geology Croft, NASA TECH.MEM. 4300, 95-97, 1991
Enceladus relief USGS maps I-1485,2156
geology Smith et al., SCIENCE, 215:504-537, 1982
Tethys relief USGS maps I-1488,2157
geology Moore+Ahern, J.GEOPHYS.RES. 88:A577-A584, 1983
Dione relief USGS maps I-1487,2158
geology Moore, ICARUS, 59:205-220, 1984
Rhea relief USGS maps I-1484,1921
geology Moore et al., J.GEOPHYS.RES. 90:C785-C795, 1985
Titan sketch Lemmon et al., ICARUS 103:329-332, 1993
Hyperion sketch Thomas+Veverka, ICARUS, 64:414-424, 1985
Iapetus relief USGS maps I-1486,2159
geology Croft, NASA TECH.MEM. 4300, 101-103, 1991
Phoebe sketch Thomas et al., J.GEOPHYS.RES. 88:8736-8742, 1983
Puck sketch Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Miranda relief USGS map I-1920
topogr Wu, LUNAR PLANET.SCI XVIII, 1110-1111, 1987
geology Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Ariel relief USGS map I-1920
geology Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Umbriel relief USGS map I-1920
geology Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Titania relief USGS map I-1920
geology Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Oberon relief USGS map I-1920
geology Croft+Soderblom, URANUS, U.Ariz.Press, 1991
Larissa relief Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS, in press, 1994
Proteus sketch Croft, ICARUS, 99:402-419, 1992
rel,topo Stooke, EARTH,MOON,PLANETS, in press, 1994
Triton relief USGS maps I-2153,2154,2275
geology Smith et al., SCIENCE 246:1422-1449, 1989
Pluto albedo Buie et al., ICARUS, 97:211-227, 1992
Charon albedo Buie et al., ICARUS, 97:211-227, 1992
4 Vesta sketch Stooke, PROC.ASTER.COMET.METEOR.'91,583-586, 1992
29 Amphitrite sketch Barucci et al., ASTER.COMET.METEOR.II,89-92, 1986
43 Ariadne sketch Detal et al., ASTRON.ASTROPHYS. 281:269-280, 1994
243 Ida sketch Binzel et al., ICARUS, 105:310-325, 1993
532 Herculina sketch Taylor et al., ICARUS, 69:354-369, 1987
624 Hektor sketch Hartmann+Cruikshank, ICARUS, 36:353-366, 1978
951 Gaspra topogr Thomas et al., ICARUS, 107:23-36, 1994
outline Veverka+, ICARUS 107:2-17 & 72-83, 1994
geology Carr et al., ICARUS, 107:61-71, 1994
4769 Castalia relief Hudson+Ostro, SCIENCE, 263:940-943, 1994
Comet Encke sketch Sekanina, ASTRON.J. 96:1455-1475, 1988
Comet Halley sketch Moehlmann+,COMETS,POST-HALLEY ERA,p764,Kluwer 1991
rel,topo Stooke+Abergel, ASTRON.ASTROPHYS 248:656-668, 1991
Swift-Tuttle sketch Sekanina, ASTRON.J. 86:1741-1773, 1981
Com.Tempel-2 sketch Sekanina, ASTRON.J. 102:350-388, 1991
Interesting books: (no single book has maps of all bodies listed above)
ATLAS PLANET ZEMNOI GRUPPA...(atlas of terrestrial planets), Russia, 1992
ATLAS OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM, Hunt & Moore (eds), Rand McNally, 1983
THE ASTRONOMER'S MANUAL, A. Rukl, Crescent Books, 1989
VOYAGER ATLAS, SIX SATURNIAN SATELLITES, Batson et al., NASA SP-474, 1984
PLANETARY MAPPING, Greeley & Batson (eds), Cambridge U.Press, 1990
MAPPING OF THE MOON, Kopal & Carder, D.Reidel Co., 1974
MARS AND ITS SATELLITES, J. Blunck, Exposition Press, 1982 (ed. 2)
"There are two ways to view the stars. As they really are,
and as we would like them to be." - Carl Sagan
|