Cygnus Orb-4 (CRS4) - Atlas V 401 - Canaveral SLC-41 - 06.12.2015 21:45 UTC

[Salo]

SFN пишет:
Это про то, что РД-180 ну очень сильный движок?  

Ну, Центавр там тоже при делах.  

[che wi]

Cygnus Moved to Launch Pad for Dec. 3 Liftoff
http://blogs.nasa.gov/orbital/2015/11/20/cygnus-moved-to-launch-pad-for-dec-3-liftoff/

Orbital ATK's enhanced Cygnus spacecraft was transported to Space Launch Complex 41 early this morning and was lifted to the top of a waiting United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket for launch Dec. 3 on a resupply mission to the International Space Station.

Спойлер

Sealed inside a protective payload fairing, the 20.5-foot-long Cygnus left the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center at about 3:20 a.m. EST. It arrived at the pad at about 5:30 a.m. A crane at the Vertical Integration Facility at SLC-41 hoisted the spacecraft and fairing into place on the Atlas V with the first phase of the connection complete around 9:30 a.m.

The spacecraft and fairing will be secured in place and a series of tests run to confirm a proper attachment. The enhanced Cygnus, which carries 25 percent more mass than the previous version, has been loaded with more than 7,100 pounds of equipment and supplies that will be used by the space station crew for daily operations and to conduct cutting edge science on the orbiting laboratory. Launch time Dec. 3 is 5:55 p.m. EST to set up a rendezvous with the station Dec. 6. The launch window extends 30 minutes.

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[Salo]

http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/11/20/space-station-cargo-ship-hoisted-atop-atlas-5-rocket/

International Space Station cargo ship hoisted atop Atlas 5 rocket       
Posted on November 20, 2015 by Justin Ray

File photo of payload hoisting. Credit: ULA
 
CAPE CANAVERAL — Loaded with over 7,300 pounds of goods for the International Space Station, a commercial Cygnus cargo vessel was mounted atop its Atlas 5 rocket booster today for launch Dec. 3.
Just over a week after stacking of the two-stage launcher began at the Vertical Integration Facility adjacent to the pad at Complex 41, the encapsulated payload was installed to top off the 194-foot-tall rocket this morning.
Shrouded in the 45-foot-long, 14-foot-diameter nose cone of the Atlas 5 and already packed full of its space station supplies, the Cygnus was trucked overnight from Kennedy Space Center's Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
An overhead crane at the VIF picked up the 16,517-pound freighter, maneuvered it into the Atlas integration building and set it in place for mating to the Centaur upper stage.
The rocket and spacecraft will undergo a tip-to-tail electrical checkout next week, followed by the Thanksgiving break and a series of final readiness reviews clear the vehicle for flight. Rollout to the launch pad occurs at 10 a.m. EST on Dec. 2.
This will be the heaviest payload ever launched by an Atlas rocket and the vehicle's first flight dedicated to the International Space Station.
The OA-4 Cygnus is carrying 7,383 pounds of provisions to the station, not counting packing materials. The total mass with packing is 7,745 pounds.
Among the specifics:
-Crew supplies: 2,604 pounds
 -Vehicle hardware: 2,220 pounds
 -Science utilization: 1,867 pounds
 -EVA gear: 500 pounds
 -Computer resources: 192 pounds
The Dec. 3 launch will put the Cygnus on a path leading to intercept of the station on Dec. 6. Liftoff will be possible during a 30-minute launch window opening at approximately 5:55 p.m. EST (2255 GMT).
The launch window is much longer than other station-bound vehicles given the Atlas 5 rocket's performance and its capability to navigate into the orbital plane of the laboratory.

[triage]

http://www.ulalaunch.com/uploads/docs/Mission_Booklets/AV/av_oa4_mob.pdf


 https://www.orbitalatk.com/news-room/feature-stories/OA4-Mission-Page/default.aspx
 https://www.orbitalatk.com/news-room/feature-stories/OA4-Mission-Page/Documents/FS025_15_Cygnus_OA-4_5307_(formerly%20Orb-4).pdf
 

 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/launch/orbital.html
 http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/orbital_atk_crs-4_mission_overview.pdf
 


было ранее про событие, но без таких фото
 http://www.americaspace.com/?page_id=33925

[Salo]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/668079008035180549

Tory Bruno Подлинная учетная запись ‏@torybruno  
InfoG: Mighty Atlas' unique ability to get this dbl load to ISS on L-Day #1: Sophisticated RAAN Steering & raw power  

 6:50 - 21 нояб. 2015 г.

[Salo]

NASA Kennedy / KSC ‏@NASAKennedy  4 ч.4 часа назад  
.@ulalaunch centaur stage was mounted atop an Atlas V rocket that will boost @OrbitalATK #Cygnus spacecraft to #ISS.  
 
  8:55 - 23 нояб. 2015 г. · Подробнее  

[Salo]

https://twitter.com/OrbitalATK/status/668860882726719488

Orbital ATK Подлинная учетная запись ‏@OrbitalATK  
#Cygnus spacecraft for #OA4 @Space_Station resupply mission mated to @ulalaunch rocket. Launch scheduled for Dec 3.  
 
  10:37 - 23 нояб. 2015 г.  

[triage]

захотелось посмотреть патчик на футболке


серия фото тут https://spaceflightnow.com/2015/11/24/photos-assembling-atlas-5-rocket-for-space-station-launch/

[triage]

характеристики расширенной версии - до 3,5 тонн, ранее для нее было до 2,7
 http://www.orbitalatk.com/space-systems/human-space-advanced-systems/commercial-resupply-services/docs/FS006_08_OA_5449%20Cygnus.pdf

отсюда http://www.orbitalatk.com/news-room/feature-stories/OA4-Mission-Page/default.aspx

[Salo]

http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/11/24/photos-assembling-atlas-5-rocket-for-space-station-launch/

Photos: Assembling Atlas 5 for International Space Station launch       
Posted on November 24, 2015 by Justin Ray
       
Relive the steps to stack the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at Cape Canaveral's Vertical Integration Facility for the Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo freighter flight to the International Space Station. The first stage was erected initially, followed by the combined interstage and Centaur upper stage, then the encapsulated payload.Launch is planned for Dec. 3 at 5:55 p.m. EST (2255 GMT).
Photos: NASA-KSC










See earlier Cygnus OA-4 coverage.

[Salo]

[triage]

отсутствует выше, кажется тоже интересная (остальные похожи на ранее выложенные)
 http://www.americaspace.com/?p=88753

[Salo]

http://spacenews.com/cygnus-prepared-for-atlas-launch-to-space-station/

Cygnus Prepared for Atlas Launch to Space Station
by Jeff Foust — November 25, 2015
 
Engineers prepare to transport Orbital ATK's enhanced Cygnus spacecraft, fitted inside the payload fairing of a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5, fr om the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center to Space Launch Complex 41. Credit: ULA  
 
WASHINGTON — Preparations for the first launch of a Cygnus cargo spacecraft in more than a year, and the first on an Atlas 5 rocket, have gone smoothly despite some changes in timing of loading cargo on the spacecraft, an Orbital ATK executive said.
An Atlas 5 is scheduled to launch the Cygnus craft from Cape Canaveral, Florida, Dec. 3. The launch will be the first for the Cygnus since the October 2014 failure of Orbital's Antares rocket shortly after liftoff from Wallops Island, Virginia.

Спойлер

Dulles, Virginia-based Orbital purchased the Atlas 5 launch from United Launch Alliance shortly after the failure, and in August acquired a second Atlas 5 for a Cygnus mission planned for March 2016. While the Cygnus has not previously flown on the Atlas, integrating the cargo spacecraft to the rocket has gone well.
"It's actually been very rewarding," Frank Culbertson, president of Orbital ATK's Space Systems Group, said in a Nov. 18 interview about the company's relationship with ULA . "We found them very easy to work with in that regard and it's been a good collaboration. We're very proud of wh ere we've gotten in such a short period of time."
This mission, designated OA-4 by Orbital ATK, is the first "enhanced" version of the Cygnus spacecraft with a larger cargo module, and will carry more than 3,500 kilograms of supplies. The payload includes a combination of space station hardware, crew supplies and experiments.
One challenge Orbital encountered during planning for this mission is that the Cygnus is encapsulated inside the Atlas payload fairing much earlier in launch preparations than it was for Antares launches. That eliminates the ability to accommodate "late load" cargo — cargo that is added to the spacecraft shortly before launch.
"It's difficult to load items late in the flow at this point," Culbertson said. The Cygnus was sealed inside the fairing more than two weeks before launch, timing he said was dictated by ULA's standard payload processing schedule for Atlas missions. "We had to fit into their current way of doing business."
The early cutoff for loading payload became an issue after the station suffered a malfunction Nov. 13 that shut off one of eight channels that relay electric power. While the problem does not affect station operations, NASA considered flying replacement hardware on the upcoming Cygnus mission.
"It turned out that could have been done, but it would have delayed the launch," Culbertson said, because Cygnus was already being installed in the payload fairing. "The pros and cons of all the various factors resulted in NASA deciding not to try to destack and load it late."
That hardware in question will instead fly on a later cargo mission.
The lack of late-load cargo also means that, unlike many other such missions, this one won't provide any fresh fruit or other perishable items for the station's crew. "It wouldn't be fresh when it got there," he said.
December's Cygnus mission will be followed by another Atlas launch of a Cygnus, called OA-6, in March. Orbital ATK plans to resume Cygnus launches on an upgraded version of its Antares rocket in May from Wallops.
"Things are going very well at Wallops," Culbertson said, praising work by NASA and the state of Virginia to repair the pad damaged in last October's launch failure. "They modified some of the systems, replaced a few items, and painted everything. It looks great."
Orbital is planning to conduct a hot-fire test of the Antares, now equipped with two RD-181 engines from the Russian company Energomash, on the pad in March. Culbertson said the integration of the new engines into the Antares first stage has gone well, and that only minor changes to the pad were needed to accommodate the engine.
The long-term future of both Antares and Cygnus, though, hinges in large part on whether Orbital ATK can secure another NASA contract to deliver cargo to the station. The company was one of several that submitted proposals to NASA nearly a year ago for the agency's Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) 2 competition. NASA has delayed awarding CRS-2 contracts several times, and now plans to announce them as late as the end of January.
Culbertson would not say much about the ongoing competition, other than  that Orbital was responding to a NASA request for updated information about its proposal. "We'll follow their direction and wait for their selection," he said.
The long delay on the CRS-2 contracts, he suggested, has affected Orbital's plans to procure components for future Cygnus missions. "Any delay in a contract like that has impacts on what you're ordering and what you're spending," he said.

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[Salo]

James Dean ‏@flatoday_jdean   19 часов назад
Early Cape Canaveral forecast 60% "go" for Dec. 3 launch of Atlas V rocket, OA-4 Cygnus cargo mission to ISS: http://1.usa.gov/1kQIsjI 

[Lanista]

Подскажите, а в чем соль круглых СБ, на Орионе тоже такие раньше рисовали. В чем выигрыш?

[STS]

Lanista пишет:
Подскажите, а в чем соль круглых СБ, на Орионе тоже такие раньше рисовали. В чем выигрыш?

на вскидку - легче чем обычные при той же площади и компактнее в сложенном состоянии
легче потому что нагрузка на узлы между панелями значительно меньше как при развертывании так и при эксплуатации

[Salo]

К тому же они изготовлены из аморфного кремния.

[Salo]

http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/11/29/international-space-station-and-crew-awaiting-atlas-5-launch/

[Oleg]

Когда пуск?

[triage]

www.ulalaunch.com
Date/Site/Launch Time: Thursday, Dec. 3, 2015, from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The 30-minute launch window opens at 5:55 p.m. EST.
Viewing the Launch by Webcast: The live webcast will begin at 4:30 p.m. EST.