SPACEWARN Bulletin, SPX-567
                  
  A publication of NASA NSSDC/WDC for Satellite Information, and the 
       World Warning Agency for Satellites, for COSPAR/ISES.

    (All information in this publication was received between
                1 January 2001 and 31 January 2001.)

*******SPECIAL NOTE: Please refer to special section D, near the end*****

A.  List of New International Designations and Launch Dates (UT).
    (USSPACECOM Catalog numbers are in parentheses.)
        
        COSPAR/WWAS USSPACECOM  SPACECRAFT           
            INT.ID    CAT. #      NAME           LAUNCH DATE (2001)
           -------------------------------------------------------
            2001-004A (26690) NAVSTAR 50 (USA 156)      30 Jan
            2001-003A (26668) PROGRESS M1-5             24 Jan
            2001-002A (26666) TURKSAT 2A                10 Jan
            2001-001C (26687) SHENZHOU 2 MODULE         09 Jan
            2001-001A (26664) SHENZHOU 2                09 Jan

B.  Text of Launch Information

2001-004A  NAVSTAR 50 (USA 156) is an American GPS navigational spacecraft
           that was launched by a Delta 2 rocket from Vandenberg AFB at 07:55 
           UT. The two-tonne satellite is the 28th member of the "second 
           generation" fleet, four of which (including the latest) being 
           replacements for the older models. A case history of all GPS 
           spacecraft is available in http://leonardo.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/Programs
           /gps.html. In GPS parlance, the spacecraft is GPS 2-28. Initial 
           orbital parameters were period 357 min, apogee 20,390, perigee
           158 km, and inclination 39.04 deg. Clearly, a major maneuver is 
           likely to modify the parameters.

2001-003A  PROGRESS M1-5 is a Russian automatic cargo carrier that was 
           launched by a Soyuz-U rocket from Baikonur at 04:28 UT. Nick-named 
           "Hearse", it is to deliver the 130 tonne MIR station to its 
           cremation over the southern Pacific. It carried two tonnes of fuel 
           part of which was for transfer to MIR for continuous attitude/orbit
           maneuver so as to to enable it to reach down to an altitude of 240 
           km, whereupon around 6 March 2001 the PROGRESS itself will give the 
           final push. It docked automatically with MIR at 05:30 UT on 27 Jan
           after a previously docked PROGRESS M-43 was evicted from its port and
           commanded from the ground to crash at about the same site in 
           southern Pacific where MIR itself will. (Six cosmonauts were on "Hot-
           Standby" to reach MIR in the event the automatic docking failed.) It
           is speculated that some, several-hundred kg fragments may land in 
           the ocean, probably 3,000 km east of southern New Zealand. Initial 
           orbital parameters were period 90.4, apogee 299 km, perigee 278 km,
           and inclination 51.6 deg.

2001-002A  TURKSAT 2 (also named EURASIASAT 1) is a Turkish geosynchronous 
           communications spacecraft that was launched by an Ariane 4 rocket 
           from Kourou at 21:39 UT. The dual name is probably due to the dual 
           ownership of the spacecraft: 75% by Turk Telecom and 25% by the 
           manufacturer Alcatel Space Company. The 3.4 tonne, 9 kW spacecraft
           will provide direct-to-home voice, video, and data transmissions
           to countries between central Europe and the Indian subcontinent,
           through its 32 "BSS- and FSS-bands" transponders, after parking 
           over 42 deg-E longitude (replacing the aging TURKSAT 1C). 

2001-001A  SHENZHOU 2 (translated as "Divine Ship", or "Magic Vessel", or
2001-001C  God Vessel") is an unmanned Chinese (PRC) spacecraft that was 
           launched by a Long March 2F rocket from Jiuquan launch center (in 
           the north-western province of Gansu) at "01:00 a.m". The descent 
           module (also carrying the name, SHENZHOU 2 but with ID 2001-001C) 
           landed smoothly in Inner Mongolia on 16 January at 11:22 UT after 
           separating from 2001-001A which continued to orbit, doing some zero-
           gravity experiments. The descent module is a prototype of an 
           eventual manned spacecraft to carry Taikongyuans (Taikonauts). A 
           major concern during this and the next few launches would be to 
           assess the integrity of the heat shield during re-entry. So far,
           there has not been any report on the heat shield. The initial
           orbital parameters of 2001-001A were period 91.3, apogee 346 km, 
           perigee 330 km, and inclination 42.6 deg.

C. Spacecraft Particularly Suited for International Participation.

   1. Spacecraft with essentially continuous radio beacons on frequencies
less than 150 MHz, or higher frequencies if especially suited for
ionospheric or geodetic studies.  (NNSS denotes U.S. Navy Navigational
Satellite System. Updates or corrections to the list are possible only with
information from the user community.)

      THE FULL LIST APPEARED IN SPX 545. (See http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/
      spacewarn/)
      THE LIST WILL NOT BE REPEATED IN  FUTURE ISSUES, UNTIL SIGNIFICANTLY
      REVISED AGAIN.
      
    2. Global Positioning System satellites useful for navigational purposes
and geodetic studies. High precision [< 20 cm] GPS constellation tracking data
obtained from the network of about 80 dedicated global stations that are of 
interest to geodetic study may be obtained through the following services 
provided by the International Association of Geodesy [IGS]).

                FTP:    igscb.jpl.nasa.gov  [directory /igscb]
                WWW:    http://igscb.jpl.nasa.gov/
                E-Mail: igscb@cobra.jpl.nasa.gov

The standard format of the GPS situation appeared in SPX-518. It will not be
repeated since an excellent source of trajectory- and science-related GPS
information is at URL
http://www.utexas.edu/depts/grg/gcraft/notes/gps/gps.html#DODSystem.
It provides many links to GPS-related data bases.

*****The latest addition to the GPS fleet is NAVSTAR 50 (2001-004A).******

    3. Russian Global Navigational (Positioning) Spacecraft, GLONASS
constellation. SPACEWARN requests updates or additions from readers to the
list. 

All GLONASS spacecraft are in the general COSMOS series. The COSMOS numbers
invoked by USSPACECOM have sometimes differed from the numbers (NNNN)
associated in Russia. The operating frequencies in MHz are computed from the
channel number K. Frequencies (MHz) are L1 = 1602.0 + 0.5625K and L2 = 1246.0 +
0.4375K. The standard format of the GLONASS situation appeared in SPX-545.
It will not be repeated in view of the excellent updated source, with the URL
http://www.rssi.ru/SFCSIC/, or http://www.rssi.ru/SFCSIC/english.html,
maintained by the Coordinational Scientific Information Center (CSIC), Russian
Space Forces.

    4. Visually bright objects. A comprehensive list of visually bright
objects with their 2-line orbital elements is available from USSPACECOM, via a
NASA URL, http://oig1.gsfc.nasa.gov/files/visible.tle. The list, however,
does not include visual magnitudes, but are expected to be brighter than
magnitude 5.

    5. Actual decays or landings of payload spacecraft and rocket bodies (R/B)
only. No further information is available.

Designations         Common Name                  Decay Date, 2001
------------         -----------                     ----------

2000-064A (26570) PROGRESS M1-4                          29 Jan
2001-003B (26689) R/B Soyuz-U                            25 Jan
1983-114D (14520) R/B that launched MOLNIYA 1-59         24 Jan
2000-031E (26499) R/B (aux. motor) Proton-K              21 Jan
2000-001B (26665) R/B Long March 2F                      20 Jan 
2001-001C (26687) SHENZHOU (Descent Module)              16 Jan
1985-090A (16110) COSMOS 1689                            14 Jan
1993-032C (22659) R/B Delta 2                            13 Jan 
1997-010B (24745) R/B Start 1                            12 Jan
2001-002B (26667) R/B Ariane 44P                         11 Jan
1985-105D (16243) R/B that launched Cosmos 1701          11 Jan
1993-072E (22925) R/B (aux.motor) Proton                 06 Jan
1970-085B (04584) R/B that launched METEOR 6             01 Jan

    6. Miscellaneous Items. (This section contains information or data that are
entered on occasion and may not be repeated in each issue of the SPACEWARN
Bulletin.) 

SPX 566 reported on LDREX (2000-081C) that "the reflector was to stay 
expanded to a diameter of six meters for about 20 min......" A later message
from Japan's NASDA is that the reflector failed to expand.

    7. Related NSSDC resources.

NSSDC/WDC for Satellite Information is an archival center for science data
from many spacecraft. Many datasets are on-line for electronic access, through
the URL,
               http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/space
For off-line data, please contact the Request Office, NSSDC, Code 633, NASA
GSFC, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771, U.S.A., for specific information (REQUEST@
NSSDCA.GSFC.NASA.GOV). Information on the current status of the instruments
on board from the investigators will be most welcomed. Precomputed trajectory
files and orbital parameters of many magnetospheric and heliospheric science-
payload spacecraft may be FTP'ed as follows:
            FTP nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov
            name: user anonymous
            password: your name@node
            cd pub/orbits

Other files interest for Earth-centered s/c can be generated thru the URL,
                  http://sscweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Codes related to the heliospheric spacecraft trajectories can be executed
through the URL,
                 http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/space/helios/heli.html
Descriptions of many spacecraft, experiments and datasets are available
through links from
                  http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/sc-query.html
                 ______________________

D.  Question:  It would be simpler if this Bulletin referred to all
persons in space by a single term, rather than letting the
person's nationality determine the term.  Would you also find
it simpler in the reading?  What term would you find most acceptable.
Our inclination, given both the source and language of this Report,
is astronaut.  If you have an opinion, please send to
joseph.king@gsfc.nasa.gov.
===========================================================================

                         SPACEWARN Bulletin

The bulletin is intended to serve as an international communication medium
for the rapid distribution of information on satellites and space probes.  The
material it contains is based on guidelines in the COSPAR Guide to Rocket and
Satellite Information and Data Exchange, COSPAR Transactions #8, December 1972,
and various Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) resolutions.

All bulletins beginning with January 1991 (SPX-447) are now available on line;
the SPX number increases by one for each succeeding month (for example, the
January 1993 bulletin is SPX-471).

The bulletin may be accessed through the World Wide Web (WWW). The URL is
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/spacewarn/

Users are encouraged to submit their comments and suggestions for the
improvement of this bulletin to SPACEWARN Bulletin: WWAS@NDADSB.GSFC.NASA.GOV.

Categories of Spacecraft

To improve the effectiveness of international distribution of satellite and
space probe information via the SPACEWARN system, spacecraft are identified in
categories according to the urgency and detail of information needed by the
scientific community as follows:

CATEGORY 1:  Spacecraft that carry essentially continuous telemetry or radio
beacons, usually on frequencies less than 150 MHz.

CATEGORY 2: GPS constellation of positioning/navigational spacecraft.

CATEGORY 3: GLONASS constellation of positioning/navigational spacecraft.

CATEGORY 4: Occasionally, a list of bright, orbiting objects of visual
magnitude 4 or brighter.

The bulletin also carries launch dates, international IDs, and USSPACECOM
catalog numbers, followed by a brief outline of the payload and orbital
parameters, re-entry of major objects, and miscellaneous sections.
These data are based on launch announcements or on information received from
individuals, launching authorities, FBIS and USSPACECOM emails, news
papers, and some Web sites.

Near the top, before "A", write

SPECIAL NOTE: Please refer to special section D below.

Then after the section on NSSDC resources, insert: