Friday, April 4, 1997
Thursday, April 3, 1997
Ryusei
1994-007A
NASDA's Orbiting Reentry Experiment (OREX) was the first Japanese reentry test, carried on the initial H-II test flight. OREX, given the postlaunch name Ryusei (Meteor). The OREX project was a collaborative program with Japan's National Aerospace Lab (NAL).
The spacecraft had a mass of 865 kg at launch, 761 kg at reentry. It was 3.4m in diameter and 1.46m high, the parabolic shape covered with thermal protection tiles for HOPE spaceplane development. It landed after a 133 minute flight in the Pacific Ocean.
Reentry analyses give the following conditions: T+7396s, 92.8 km altitude, 7.545km/s; T+7461s, 63.6 km altitude, 6.223 km/s. The velocities are Earth-relative and the entry angle was not reported, so the exact trajectory is unclear.
| Ryusei | |||
| Date | Time | Event | Orbit |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 Feb 3 | 2220:00? | Launch by H-II (H-2-1F) | TNSC |
| 2221 | SRB sep (T+1:37) 40 km | ||
| 2223 | Fairing sep (T+3:45) | ||
| 2226 | LE-7 MECO, (T+6:01) 227 km | -4800? x 370? x 30 | |
| LE-7 sep T+6:09 | |||
| 2226 | LE-5A TIG (T+6:15) | ||
| 2233 | LE-5A MECO1 (T+13:16), 454 km | ||
| 2233:50 | OREX sep (T+13:50) | 93.66 448 x 458 x 30.5 | |
| 1994 Feb 4 | 0001:03 | T+1:41:03 Deorbit burn at apogee over 30N | 450 x 454 x 30.51 |
| 0005:48 | T+1:45:48 Deorbit burn complete | -216 x 460 x 30.51 | |
| 0022:05 | 120 km Reentry (Vrel 7.325, -3.17 deg) | ||
| 0022:41 | 105 km, 7.451 m/s | ||
| 0023:03 | T+2:03:03 80 km, 7.42km/s | ||
| 0025:01 | 48 km, 3.0 km/s | ||
| 0033:02 | Landed 459 km S of Christmas Island | ||
Wednesday, April 2, 1997
DFH-24
1988-080A
The first FY-1 (Wind and Cloud) satellite carried radiometers to return Earth weather imagery. The FY satellites are built by SISE (Shanghai Inst of Satellite Engineering), part of CAST until 1993 and then part of SBA.
The China Meteorological Administration operates the National Satellite Meteorological Center in Beijing, which controls the satellites via ground stations in Beijing, Guangzhou and Urumqi.
| Feng Yun 1 | |||
| Date | Time | Event | Orbit |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1988 Sep 6 | 2030 | Launch by CZ-4 | T'ai Yuan |
| 2032 | T+2:31 St 1 MECO | ||
| 2032 | T+2:32 St 1 sep | ||
| 2032 | T+2:47 Fairing sep | ||
| 2036 | T+6:38 St 2 MECO | ||
| 2036 | T+6:48 St 2 VECO | ||
| 2036 | T+6:49 St 2 sep | ||
| 2036 | St 3 burn? | ||
| St 3 burn 303s? | |||
| 2040 | T+10:10 St 3 MECO | ||
| 2041 | T+11:05 St 3 sep | 102.8 881 x 904 x 99.1 | |
| 1996 Oct 15 | End of operations | ||
Payload:
- VIRR 5-channel Vis/IR Radiometer
- HRPT Hi Res picture transmission system (NOAA compatible)
Kiku 6
1994-056A
The ETS-6 Engineering Test Satellite, built by Toshiba, was to be the first geostationary payload for the H-II rocket,to be stationed at 154E. However, the 2kN bipropellant apogee LAPS stage built by Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries (IHI) failed. The Kiku 6 satellite was placed in an orbit which repeated its ground track every three days. The low orbit required the solar panels to rotate much faster than anticipated. A year after launch NASDA reported that many of the planned experiments with the S, K and O-band systems had been carried out, but laser communication tests were less successful because of the high orbital motion rates.
| Kiku-6 | |||
| Date | Time | Event | Orbit |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 Aug 28 | 0750 | Launch by H-II-2 | |
| 0755 | Stage 1 MECO (T+5:47) | ||
| 0755 | Stage 2 burn for 6:41 | ||
| 0802 | Stage 2 MECO, coast 12 min | ||
| 0814 | Stage 2 burn 2 | ||
| Stage 2 MECO-2 | |||
| 0818 | Stage 2 sep | 250 x 36338 | |
| 1994 Aug 31 | 0519 | LAPS burn | |
| 1994 Aug 31 | 1510 | LAPS separated | 7791 x 38715 x 13.1 |
| 1995 Aug | Still operating | ||