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STS-49
STS-49 was the NASA maiden flight of the Space Shuttle ''Endeavour'', which launched on May 7, 1992. The primary goal of its nine-day mission was to retrieve an Intelsat VI satellite, Intelsat 603, which failed to leave Low Earth orbit two years before, attach it to a new upper stage, and relaunch it to its intended geosynchronous orbit. After several attempts, the capture was completed with the only three-person extravehicular activity (EVA) in space flight history. It would also stand until STS-102 in 2001 as the longest EVA ever undertaken. Crew Spacewalks * '' Thuot and Hieb '' – EVA 1 *EVA 1 Start: May 10, 1992 – 20:40 UTC *EVA 1 End: May 11, 1992 – 00:23 UTC *Duration: 3 hours, 43 minutes * '' Thuot and Hieb '' – EVA 2 *EVA 2 Start: May 11, 1992 – 21:05 UTC *EVA 2 End: May 12, 1992 – 02:35 UTC *Duration: 5 hours, 30 minutes * '' Thuot, Hieb and Akers '' – EVA 3 *EVA 3 Start: May 13, 1992 – 21:17 UTC *EVA 3 End: May 14, 1992 – 05:46 UTC *Duration ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Hieb
Richard James Hieb (born September 21, 1955 in Jamestown, North Dakota) is a former NASA astronaut and a veteran of three Space Shuttle missions. He was a mission specialist on STS-39 and STS-49, and was a payload commander on STS-65. After leaving NASA he worked at AlliedSignal and Orbital before spending 14 years as an executive at Lockheed Martin. He is currently faculty memberin the University of Colorado Boulder Smead Aerospace Engineering Sciences Department. Early life and education Hieb's family originates from many places in Europe, and includes one line that came to the Americas in the 1600s. The name Hieb is of German origin. His mother was a long time elementary school teacher at Lincoln Elementary in Jamestown, North Dakota and his father was a transport driver before retiring and operating a small business buying and selling antiques and specialty items where he was a well-known figure at sales around eastern North Dakota. Hieb received a Bachelor of Arts degree in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Space Shuttle Endeavour
Space Shuttle ''Endeavour'' (Orbiter Vehicle Designation: OV-105) is a retired orbiter from NASA's Space Shuttle program and the fifth and final operational Shuttle built. It embarked on its first mission, STS-49, in May 1992 and its 25th and final mission, STS-134, in May 2011. STS-134 was expected to be the final mission of the Space Shuttle program, but with the authorization of STS-135 by the United States Congress, Space Shuttle Atlantis, ''Atlantis'' became the last shuttle to fly. The United States Congress approved the construction of ''Endeavour'' in 1987 to replace the Space Shuttle Challenger, Space Shuttle ''Challenger'', which was Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, destroyed in 1986. NASA chose, on cost grounds, to build much of ''Endeavour'' from spare parts rather than refitting the Space Shuttle Enterprise, Space Shuttle ''Enterprise'', and used structural spares built during the construction of ''Space Shuttle Discovery, Discovery'' and Space Shuttle Atlantis, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Akers
Thomas Dale Akers (born May 20, 1951) is a former American astronaut in NASA's Space Shuttle program. Education Akers was the valedictorian of his 29-member 1969 senior class from Eminence, Missouri. He worked summers as a park ranger in the 80,000 acre federal wilderness that borders Eminence. He graduated from the University of Missouri-Rolla (now the Missouri University of Science and Technology) with B.S. and M.S. degrees in applied mathematics in 1973 and 1975, respectively. At the age of 24, he returned to Eminence to become its math teacher, and subsequently its high school principal. In 1979, when a United States Air Force recruiter left brochures on his desk for his students, it was Akers who decided to sign up. He was selected for the astronaut program in 1987 and officially became an astronaut in 1988. As part of his training with NASA, Akers taught science classes at Troy State University for a brief period of time. NASA career Akers is a veteran of four s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Daniel Brandenstein
Daniel Charles Brandenstein (born January 17, 1943) is the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of United Space Alliance. He is a former Naval Aviator, test pilot and NASA astronaut, who flew four Space Shuttle missions. He also served as Chief of the Astronaut Office from 1987 to 1992. Career Military After graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics and physics from the University of Wisconsin–River Falls, and having been a member of Phi Sigma Kappa, Brandenstein entered active duty with the U.S. Navy in September 1965 and was attached to the Naval Air Training Command for flight training. He was designated a Naval Aviator at Naval Air Station Beeville, Texas, in May 1967 and then proceeded to attack squadron VA-128 for A-6 Intruder fleet replacement training. From 1968 to 1970, while attached to VA-196 flying A-6s, he participated in two combat deployments on board the aircraft carriers and to Southeast Asia where he flew 192 combat mis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Extravehicular Activity
Extravehicular activity (EVA) is any activity done by an astronaut in outer space outside a spacecraft. In the absence of a breathable Earthlike atmosphere, the astronaut is completely reliant on a space suit for environmental support. EVA includes ''spacewalks'' and lunar or planetary surface exploration (commonly known from 1969 to 1972 as ''moonwalks''). In a stand-up EVA (SEVA), an astronaut stands through an open hatch but does not fully leave the spacecraft. EVA has been conducted by the Soviet Union/Russia, the United States, Canada, the European Space Agency and China. On March 18, 1965, Alexei Leonov became the first human to perform a spacewalk, exiting the Voskhod 2 capsule for 12 minutes and 9 seconds. On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first human to perform a moonwalk, outside his lunar lander on Apollo 11 for 2 hours and 31 minutes. On the last three Moon missions, astronauts also performed deep-space EVAs on the return to Earth, to retrieve film ca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intelsat 603
Intelsat 603 or IS-603, previously named Intelsat VI F-3, is a communications satellite operated by Intelsat. Launched in 1990, it was the second of five Intelsat VI satellites to be launched. The Intelsat VI series was constructed by Hughes Aircraft, based on the HS-389 satellite bus. Launch Intelsat 603 was launched at 11:52:31 UTC on 14 March 1990, atop a Commercial Titan III carrier rocket, flight number CT-2, with an Orbus-21S upper stage. The launch took place from Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and was intended to place Intelsat 603 into a geosynchronous transfer orbit. The Orbus-21S failed to separate from the Titan's second stage, and as a result it was unable to fire, leaving Intelsat 603 in low Earth orbit. Following the launch failure, Intelsat commissioned NASA to launch a replacement perigee motor to raise the satellite's orbit. During its maiden flight, STS-49, in 1992 rendezvoused with and captured Intelsat 603, and astronauts attac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Commercial Titan III
The Commercial Titan III, also known as CT-3 or CT-III, was an American expendable launch system, developed by Martin Marietta during the late 1980s and flown four times during the early 1990s. It was derived from the Titan 34D, and was originally proposed as a medium-lift expendable launch system for the US Air Force, who selected the Delta II instead. Development was continued as a commercial launch system, and the first rocket flew in 1990. Due to higher costs than contemporary rockets such as the Ariane 4, orders were not forthcoming, and the CT-3 was retired in 1992. The Commercial Titan III differed from the Titan 34D in that it had a stretched second stage, and a larger payload fairing to accommodate dual satellite payloads. All four launches occurred from LC-40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The first carried two communications satellites, Skynet 4A and JCSAT-2, and was launched at 00:07 UTC on 1 January 1990, which was 19:07 local time on 31 December 1989, maki ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intelsat VI
The Intelsat VI series of satellites were the 8th generation of geostationary communications satellites for the Intelsat Corporation. Designed and built by Hughes Aircraft Company (HAC) in 1983-1991, there were five VI-series satellites built: 601, 602, 603, 604, and 605. Design The Intelsat VI satellite was designed as a spinning satellite as had previous satellite designs. The main body of the spacecraft was spun at 30 revolutions per minute (rpm) to impart gyroscopic stability to the satellite in the Earth's gravitation field. A section of the spacecraft supporting the communications payload and antenna was de-spun to allow the antenna to point at the desired location on the earth. The Intelsat VI series combined two design features of previous HAC satellites, larger solar array and wide body design. The HS376 extended power spinner satellite had an extra concentric cylindrical solar array which deployed after launch to increase the power generating capability of the satellit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
STS-50
STS-50 (U.S. Microgravity Laboratory-1) was a NASA Space Shuttle mission, the 12th mission of the '' Columbia'' orbiter. ''Columbia'' landed at Kennedy Space Center for the first time ever due to bad weather at Edwards Air Force Base caused by the remnants of Hurricane Darby. Crew Backup crew Crew seating arrangements Mission highlights The U.S. Microgravity Laboratory-1 was a spacelab mission, with experiments in material science, fluid physics and biotechnology. It was the first flight of a Space Shuttle with the Extended Duration Orbiter (EDO) hardware, allowing longer flight durations. Primary payload, U.S. Microgravity Laboratory-1 (USML- 1), made its first flight; featured pressurized Spacelab module. USML-1 first in planned series of flights to advance U.S. microgravity research effort in several disciplines. Experiments conducted were: Crystal Growth Furnace (CGF); Drop Physics Module (DPM); Surface Tension Driven Convection Experiments (STDCE); Zeolit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
STS-45
STS-45 was a 1992 NASA Space Shuttle mission using the . Its almost nine-day scientific mission was with a non-deployable payload of instruments. It was the 46th Space Shuttle mission and the 11th for ''Atlantis''. Crew Backup crew Crew seating arrangements Mission highlights ''Atlantis'' was launched on March 24, 1992, at 8:13 a.m. EST. The launch was originally scheduled for March 23, 1992, but was delayed by one day because of higher-than-allowable concentrations of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen in the orbiter's aft compartment during tanking operations. During troubleshooting, the leaks could not be reproduced, leading engineers to believe that they were the result of plumbing in the main propulsion system not thermally conditioned to the cryogenic propellants; the launch was rescheduled for March 24, 1992. ''Atlantis'' weighed at launch. STS-45 carried the first Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science (ATLAS-1) experiments, placed on Spacela ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geosynchronous Orbit
A geosynchronous orbit (sometimes abbreviated GSO) is an Earth-centered orbit with an orbital period that matches Earth's rotation on its axis, 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds (one sidereal day). The synchronization of rotation and orbital period means that, for an observer on Earth's surface, an object in geosynchronous orbit returns to exactly the same position in the sky after a period of one sidereal day. Over the course of a day, the object's position in the sky may remain still or trace out a path, typically in a figure-8 form, whose precise characteristics depend on the orbit's inclination and eccentricity. A circular geosynchronous orbit has a constant altitude of . A special case of geosynchronous orbit is the geostationary orbit, which is a circular geosynchronous orbit in Earth's equatorial plane with both inclination and eccentricity equal to 0. A satellite in a geostationary orbit remains in the same position in the sky to observers on the surface. Communicat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Space Shuttle Program
The Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. Its official name, Space Transportation System (STS), was taken from a 1969 plan for Space Transportation System, a system of reusable spacecraft of which it was the only item funded for development. It flew 135 missions and carried 355 astronauts from 16 countries, many on multiple trips. The Space Shuttle—composed of an Space Shuttle orbiter, orbiter launched with two reusable Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster, solid rocket boosters and a disposable Space Shuttle external tank, external fuel tank—carried up to eight astronauts and up to of Payload (air and space craft), payload into low Earth orbit (LEO). When its mission was complete, the orbiter would atmospheric reentry, reenter the Earth's atmosphere and land like a glider (aircr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
