Cygnus OA-9 (CRS-9) - Antares-230 - MARS LP-0A - 21.05.2018 08:44 UTC

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Chris B - NSF‏ @NASASpaceflight 2 мин. назад

FEATURE ARTICLE: Antares set for OA-9 Cygnus launch to the ISS -

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/05/antares-oa-9-cygnus-launch-iss/ ...

4000 word (note it's over two pages) article by William Graham

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Orbital ATK‏Подлинная учетная запись @OrbitalATK 6 мин. назад

The weather is lifting for a moment at @NASA_Wallops and we're excited to share a sunny shot of #Antares and #Cygnus on the pad

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Prelaunch Status Briefing for Orbital ATK Resupply Mission to the Space Station

NASA Video

Опубликовано: 20 мая 2018 г.

(37:45)

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Orbital ATK‏Подлинная учетная запись @OrbitalATK 7 мин. назад

#OA9 Fun Fact: Cargo going up to astronauts aboard the @Space_Station with tomorrow morning's #Antares launch of #Cygnus includes care packages, food, a plant habitat and even a GoPro for EVAs!

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https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/05/20/orbital-atk-readies-cargo-ship-for-launch-to-space-station/

Orbital ATK readies cargo ship for launch to space station
May 20, 2018 | William Harwood


Ground crews load the Cygnus supply ship before its trip to the International Space Station set to begin with launch Monday. Credit: Orbital ATK

Orbital ATK readied an upgraded Antares rocket for launch Monday from Wallops Island, Va., to deliver more than 3 tons of crew supplies, science gear, spare parts and three small satellites to the International Space Station to test miniaturized, low-cost technologies for Earth observation applications.

The experiments headed for orbit include a quantum physics study that will attempt to cool atoms to a billionth of a degree above absolute zero, another to test a novel technique for separating liquids and one devoted to learning more about how concrete sets up in the absence of gravity.

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"A lot of time when I'm asked what's the research that I do, and I just say simply concrete, people give me a blank look and say they don't give a Ph.D. for concrete research. Well yes, they do!" said Aleksandra Radlinska, principal investigator for the Microgravity Investigation of Cement Solidification, or MICS, at Pennsylvania State University.

"Because we are looking into colonizing space, we want to go to the moon and deep space beyond and we will need shelters for the human mission, we will need to protect equipment from the radiation effects and impacts they could experience, we need to find a way to produce these shelters and produce a safe environment for humans or instruments."

Despite decades of research, she said, "we still don't understand the process completely."

"For every person sitting in this room, there's one ton of concrete being produced and consumed every year," she said during a briefing Saturday. "And every ton of concrete is responsible for emission of approximately .8 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. We really need to understand much better what is happening with this material."

With forecasters predicting a 65 percent change of favorable weather, the Antares rocket was scheduled for liftoff from pad 0A at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport — MARS — at NASA's Wallops Island, Va., facility at 4:39 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) Monday. Launch originally was planned for Sunday but it was delayed one day due to weather and additional inspections.

It will be Orbital ATK's ninth launch of a Cygnus cargo ship under an 11-flight contract with NASA that is expected to total $2.89 billion, or $262.6 million per flight, according to NASA's inspector general. The company also holds a follow-on contract for at least six resupply missions at an as-yet-unspecified cost.

SpaceX also holds NASA contracts for commercial resupply totaling $3.04 billion for 20 flights, averaging $152.1 million per flight. Each company has suffered a resupply launch failure with SpaceX losing a Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon cargo ship in June 2015, eight months after an Antares failure seconds after liftoff in October 2014.

Assuming the upgraded Antares 230 gets off on time Monday, the Cygnus cargo ship will execute an autonomous rendezvous, catching up with the station early Thursday. The lab's robot arm then will be used to capture the spacecraft and pull it in for berthing at the central Unity module's Earth-facing port.

The astronauts will unload the cargo ship and re-pack it with trash and no-longer-needed equipment. If all goes well, the Cygnus will be unberthed and released from the station in mid July. Another six small "cubesats" will be deployed before the spacecraft plunges back into the atmosphere and burns up.

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https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/05/20/oa-9-mission-status-center/

Live coverage: Antares rocket set for launch from Virginia
May 20, 2018 | Stephen Clark

05/21/2018 01:13 Stephen Clark

The Antares launch team on Sunday completed their final pre-countdown verifications, including a combined systems test in which the launcher's telemetry transmitters were powered up for a compatibility check with the Wallops range.

Final closeouts of the Antares rocket and ground systems at pad 0A at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Virginia were planned later Sunday.

The Antares team will arrive in the launch control center around 10 p.m. EDT Sunday night (0200 GMT Monday), and the countdown clock will start ticking at 10:24 p.m. EDT (0224 GMT).

Loading of the Antares rocket's first stage with RP-1 fuel and liquid oxygen should begin around 90 minutes prior to liftoff.

The launch team will load around 41,000 gallons (155,000 liters) of liquid oxygen and 21,000 gallons (79,000 liters) of rocket-grade kerosene into the Antares first stage.

Liftoff of the 139-foot-tall (42.5-meter) rocket from Wallops Island, Virginia, is set for 4:39 a.m. EDT (0839 G MT) Monday with more than three tons of supplies for the International Space Station.

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https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/05/20/photos-antares-rocket-poised-for-liftoff-from-virginias-eastern-shore/

Photos: Antares rocket poised for liftoff from Virginia's Eastern Shore
May 20, 2018 | Stephen Clark

A 139-foot-tall (42.5-meter) Antares rocket is slated for a predawn launch Monday from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Virginia's Eastern Shore, carrying a Cygnus supply ship heading for the International Space Station.

The two-stage commercial rocket and cargo carrier, developed and operated by Orbital ATK, will haul 7,386 pounds (3,350 kilograms) of supplies, experiments and hardware to the space station's six-person crew.

Liftoff is scheduled for 4:39 a.m. EDT (0839 GMT) Monday from pad 0A at the spaceport located on Wallops Island, Virginia.

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It will be Orbital ATK's ninth operational resupply launch to the space station, the eighth flight of an Antares rocket, and the third mission using the company's latest Antares launcher configuration with new RD-181 main engines.

See our Mission Status Center for details on the resupply flight.


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: Alex Polimeni/Spaceflight Now


Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani


Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani


Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani


Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

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05/21/2018 05:38 Stephen Clark

The countdown began on time to begin final preps for Monday's 4:39 a.m. EDT (0839 GMT) blastoff of the 14-story Antares rocket from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.

The Antares rocket will be powered up shortly after 12 a.m. EDT (0400 GMT), and the launch team is going through a checklist of testing to ensure all systems are in good shape. The launch pad is also scheduled to be evacuated of all personnel.

The call-to-stations for the engineers on the launch team occurred around 10 p.m. EDT (0200 GMT), with voice checks and opening of the prelaunch checklist at 10:24 p.m. EDT (0224 GMT).

Propellant loading should begin around 90 minutes prior to liftoff.

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05/21/2018 06:49 Stephen Clark

The launch weather officer at Wallops just briefed the Antares team, and the outlook remains favorable for liftoff at 4:39:07 a.m. EDT (0839:07 GMT).

The forecast has improved somewhat over the last day, with meteorologists now predicting a 75 percent probability of favorable weather at launch time.

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A cold front is expected to pass through the Wallops Island region around launch time, bringing a slight chance of showers to the area.

But most of the precipitation should be away from Wallops at 4:39 a.m., with a few clouds at 6,500 feet, a few cloud at 10,000 feet, and a broken cloud deck at 25,000 feet in the forecast.

Winds should be from the north-northeast at 5 knots, and the temperature at launch time is predicted to be around 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

The primary weather concerns are with violating the disturbed weather, cumulus cloud and low cloud ceiling rules.

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05/21/2018 06:55 Stephen Clark

All personnel have evacuated the launch pad and are at a nearby fallback area, clearing the way for the launch team to begin powering up the vehicle for pre-launch testing.

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05/21/2018 07:12 Stephen Clark

The launch team has powered up the Antares and Cygnus vehicles for systems checks.

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05/21/2018 07:32 Stephen Clark

The countdown is moving into testing of the Antares rocket's beacon and telemetry transmitters. This will be followed by checks of the vehicle's flight termination system.

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https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/05/20/antares-launch-timeline-on-the-oa-9-cargo-mission/

Antares launch timeline on the OA-9 cargo mission
May 20, 2018 | Stephen Clark


Credit: Orbital ATK

Orbital ATK's Antares rocket will deliver a Cygnus supply ship into orbit Monday to begin a three-day pursuit of the International Space Station.

The rocket's two RD-181 engines will ignite around 3.7 seconds before liftoff from pad 0A at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport, a complex owned by the state of Virginia at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility.

Launch is timed for 4:39 a.m. EDT (0839 GMT) Monday.

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The first stage's two RD-181 engines will power up to 864,000 pounds of thrust and burn for 3 minutes, 35 seconds, to accelerate the rocket to more than 8,750 mph (3.9 kilometers per second) and an altitude of around 61 miles (99 kilometers), then separate from the upper stage's Castor 30XL motor about six seconds later.

The launch, known as OA-9 in Orbital ATK's station resupply manifest, will be the third Antares mission using new, more powerful RD-181 engines, which the company ordered from the Russian engine-builder NPO Energomash to replace decades-old Russian-built AJ26 engines blamed for an Antares rocket crash seconds after liftoff in October 2014.

Once the first stage finished its job on the OA-9 launch the Antares rocket's 12.8-foot-diameter (3.9-meter) diameter payload shroud will jettison in two halves at around T+plus 4 minutes, 11 seconds. An interstage adapter that connected the first and second stages will separate at T+plus 4 minutes, 16 seconds.

The launcher's Castor 30XL solid-fueled upper stage will ignite at T+plus 4 minutes, 24 seconds, and generate up to 104,300 pounds of thrust during a burn lasting approximately 2 minutes, 42 seconds. The second stage motor will burn out at approximately T+plus 7 minutes, 6 seconds, then deploy the Cygnus spacecraft at around T+plus 9 minutes, 6 seconds.

The spacecraft's two cymbal-shaped electricity-generating solar arrays will unfurl in a fan-like motion around 90 minutes into the mission, and the ship's thrusters will begin fine-tuning its approach to the space station with a series of course-correction burns Tuesday and Wednesday, setting up for a laser-guided final approach Thursday.

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05/21/2018 07:58 Stephen Clark

The propellant loading sequencer has been initiated, beginning steps to ready the Antares rocket and ground systems for filling of the first stage with liquid propellants later in the countdown.

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05/21/2018 08:15 Stephen Clark

The launch team is proceeding with testing of the Antares rocket's flight termination system, which would be used to destroy the vehicle if it flew off course after liftoff.

Once the destruct system testing is complete, a "red team" will be dispatched back to the launch pad to troubleshoot an issue with a gaseous nitrogen regulator.

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Updated: 05/21/2018 08:39 Stephen Clark

While the launch team prepares to send a red team to the launch pad to troubleshoot a nitrogen regulator issue, the Wallops range is now "red" because two C-band tracking radars are currently down.

Teams are repairing one of the radars, which has a problem with an encoder. That radar should be back operational in about an hour, allowing the range to be ready for today's launch. Another radar has a problem with an azimuth drive system.

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Orbital ATK‏Подлинная учетная запись @OrbitalATK 2 мин. назад

L-3 hours and our countdown is proceeding. We are currently green for launch, with a 25% probability of violation (POV) in terms of weather. Both #Antares and #Cygnus are healthy. #OA9

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05/21/2018 08:45 Stephen Clark

Technicians have resolved the problem with one of the C-band tracking radars after cleaning an electronics card, and the Wallops range is now "green" for launch.