- Member since
June 2012
- From: Anniston, AL
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Posted by GAF
on Thursday, April 11, 2019 11:30 PM
Watched the Falcon Heavy launch tonight. Was spectacular! The most powerful booster since the Saturn V!
I don't have much to report tonight. I've been puttying around the heat shield and the CM body trying to smooth it out. The 2nd layer of putty is on now, and after that is dry I'll sand it out and hopefully that will be good. I have a feeling, however, that a 3rd layer will be necessary. Things just go that way.
Some interesting things happened today in space history.
Today in Space History:
1961 April 11 - .
- Vostok 1 countdown - . Nation: Russia. Related Persons: Feoktistov, Gagarin, Korolev, Titov, Yazdovskiy. Program: Vostok. Flight: Vostok 1. Spacecraft: Vostok.
The booster is rolled out to the pad at 05:00. At 10:00 the cosmonauts meet with Feoktistov for a last review of the flight plan. Launch is set of 09:07 the next day, followed by shutdown and jettison of the lateral boosters of the first stage at 09:09, and orbital insertion at 09:18. The spacecraft will orient itself toward the sun for retrofire at 09:50. At 10:15 the first command sequence will be uploaded to the spacecraft, followed by the second at 10:18 and the third at 10:25. Retrofire of the TDU engine will commence at 10:25:47. The service module will separate from the capsule at 10:36 as the capsule begins re-entry. The capsule's parachute will deploy at 10:43:43 and at 10:44:12 the cosmonaut's ejection seat will fire. While the cosmonauts go through this, the booster has been brought upright on the pad, the service towers raised, and all umbilical connections made. Korolev, Yazdovskiy, and the others make a final inspection at the pad prior to the commencement of the countdown. At 13:00 Gagarin meets a group of soldiers, NCO's, and officers. After this Kamanin and the cosmonauts go to the cottage formerly occupied by Marshal Nedelin, where they will spend the last night before launch. They eat 'space food' out of 160 g toothpaste-type tubes for lunch - two servings of meat puree and one of chocolate sauce. Gagarin's blood pressure is measured as 115/60, pulse 64, body temperature 36.8 deg C. He then subjects to placement of the biosensors he will wear during the flight, and baseline measurements are taken for an hour and twenty minutes. He is very calm through all this. At 21:30 Korolev comes to the cottage, says good night to the cosmonauts, then goes back out to check on launch preparations. Gagarin and Titov go to bed after this. Kamanin stays up a while in the next room, listening to them talk to one another in the dark.
1970 April 11 - . 19:13 GMT - . Launch Site: Cape Canaveral. Launch Complex: Cape Canaveral LC39A. Launch Platform: LUT3. Launch Vehicle: Saturn V.
- Apollo 13 - . Call Sign: Odyssey. Crew: Haise, Lovell, Swigert. Backup Crew: Duke, Mattingly, Young. Support Crew: Brand, Kerwin, Lousma. Payload: Apollo CSM 109 / Apollo LM 7 / ALSEP / S-IVB-508. Mass: 28,790 kg (63,470 lb). Nation: USA. Related Persons: Brand, Duke, Haise, Kerwin, Lousma, Lovell, Mattingly, Swigert, Young. Agency: NASA Houston. Program: Apollo. Class: Moon. Type: Manned lunar spacecraft. Flight: Apollo 13. Spacecraft: Apollo CSM. Duration: 5.95 days. Decay Date: 1970-04-17 . USAF Sat Cat: 4371 . COSPAR: 1970-029A. Apogee: 186 km (115 mi). Perigee: 184 km (114 mi). Inclination: 32.50 deg. Period: 88.31 min.
Apollo 13 (AS-508) was launched from Pad A, Launch Complex 39, KSC, at 2:13 p.m. EST April 11, with astronauts James A. Lovell, Jr., John L. Swigert, Jr., and Fred W. Haise, Jr., aboard. The spacecraft and S-IVB stage entered a parking orbit with a 185.5-kilometer apogee and a 181.5-kilometer perigee. At 3:48 p.m., onboard TV was begun for five and one-half minutes. At 4:54 p.m., an S-IVB burn placed the spacecraft on a translunar trajectory, after which the CSM separated from the S-IVB and LM Aquarius. (The crew had named lunar module 7 Aquarius and CSM 109 Odyssey.) The CSM then hard-docked with the LM. The S-IVB auxiliary propulsion system made an evasive maneuver after CSM/LM ejection from the S-IVB at 6:14 p.m. The docking and ejection maneuvers were televised during a 72-minute period in which interior and exterior views of the spacecraft were also shown.
At 8:13 p.m. EST a 217-second S-IVB auxiliary propulsion system burn aimed the S-IVB for a lunar target point so accurately that another burn was not required. The S-IVB/IU impacted the lunar surface at 8:10 p.m. EST on April 14 at a speed of 259 meters per second. Impact was 137.1 kilometers from the Apollo 12 seismometer. The seismic signal generated by the impact lasted 3 hours 20 minutes and was so strong that a ground command was necessary to reduce seismometer gain and keep the recording on the scale. The suprathermal ion detector experiment, also deployed by the Apollo 12 crew, recorded a jump in the number of ions from zero at the time of impact up to 2,500 shortly thereafter and then back to a zero count. Scientists theorized that ionization had been produced by 6,300 K to 10,300 K (6,000 degrees C to 10,000 degrees C) temperature generated by the impact or that particles had reached an altitude of 60 kilometers from the lunar surface and had been ionized by sunlight.
Meanwhile back in the CSM/LM, the crew had been performing the routine housekeeping duties associated with the period of the translunar coast. At 30:40 ground elapsed time a midcourse correction maneuver took the spacecraft off a free-return trajectory in order to control the arrival time at the moon. Ensuring proper lighting conditions at the landing site. The maneuver placed the spacecraft on the desired trajectory, on which the closest approach to the moon would be 114.9 kilometers.
At 10:08 p.m. EST April 13, the crew reported an undervoltage alarm on the CSM main bus B, rapid loss of pressure in SM oxygen tank No. 2, and dropping current in fuel cells 1 and 3 to a zero reading. The loss of oxygen and primary power in the service module required an immediate abort of the mission. The astronauts powered up the LM, powered down the CSM, and used the LM systems for power and life support. The first maneuver following the abort decision was made with the descent propulsion system to place the spacecraft back in a free-return trajectory around the moon. After the spacecraft swung around the moon, another maneuver reduced the coast time back to earth and moved the landing point from the Indian Ocean to the South Pacific.
- Apollo 13 LM - . Call Sign: Aquarius. Payload: Apollo LM 7. Mass: 15,192 kg (33,492 lb). Nation: USA. Agency: NASA Houston. Program: Apollo. Class: Moon. Type: Manned lunar spacecraft. Flight: Apollo 13. Spacecraft: Apollo LM. Duration: 5.95 days. Decay Date: 1970-04-17 . USAF Sat Cat: 4371 . COSPAR: 1970-029x. Apogee: 186 km (115 mi). Perigee: 184 km (114 mi). Inclination: 32.50 deg. Period: 88.31 min.
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April 11, 2019 - 6:35 pm EDT / 2235 GMT; Launch Site: Cape Canaveral
Space X's Falcon Heavy, the most powerful operational launch vehicle, placed the Arabsat-6A communications satellite into orbit. All three sections of the booster returned to ground and landed successfully.
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April 11, 2019 - 3:25 pm EDT / 1925 GMT
The robotic Bereshet spacecraft, built by SpaceIL and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), aimed to become the first Israeli craft, and the first privately funded mission, ever to land softly on the moon. But the little robot couldn't quite make it, crashing into the gray dirt around 3:25 p.m. EDT (1925 GMT). Mission control lost communications with the spacecraft when it was about 489 feet (149 meters) above the moon's surface.
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