From: mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu (Jonathan McDowell)
Subject: Jonathan's Space Report no. 109
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA,  USA
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1992 15:21:41 GMT

Jonathan's Space Report

No. 109      1992 Apr  6

Thanks for all those who have emailed me so far; keep those
letters coming in!
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Atlantis landed on runway 33 at Kennedy Space Center at 1123 UTC on Apr 2.
The mission makes Kathy Sullivan the women's record holder for cumulative
spaceflight time. All experiments returned some data. Atlantis' next
mission is the Tethered Satellite expeiment.
The static firing of Endeavour was carried out on Apr 6, clearing the
way to its first launch next month.

A new SNG spy satellite, Kosmos-2182, was launched by Soyuz rocket on
Apr 1 around 1430 UTC, replacing Kosmos-2175 (which was deorbited on Mar
20 as expected) as their only imaging satellite. K-2182 is the same
class as K-2175, and is expected to be deorbited on May 29. It is
in a 67 degree low earth orbit.

Of the 19 new NASA astronaut candidates announced this week, only 4 are
pilot astronauts. This is the lowest ratio of pilots to mission
specialists yet and reflects the fact that more mission specialists than
pilots fly on each mission.
Breakdown:
Pilots 4, Mission Specialists 15
Men 16, Women 3
Civilians 9, USN 7, USAF 2, US Army 1
Ph.D  8, MD 4 (including two with both)
Last Job: Edwards AFB 1, Pax River 1, Other military 8, 
          NASA-JSC 3, JPL 1, other 5
More generic military people are being selected, fewer civilians and
fewer USAF and USN test pilots from Edwards and Pax River (the latter
reflecting the smaller number of pilot astronauts). I don't understand
the preference for military mission specialists given the lack
of DoD missions on the schedule.

 Summary list:
Mission Specialists
 Dr Daniel Barry, MD PhD
 Dr Charles Brady, Cdr USN, MD
 Dr Catherine Coleman, Capt USAF, PhD
 Dr Michael Gernhardt, PhD
 Dr John Grunsfeld, PhD
 Wendy Lawrence, LtCdr USN
 Dr. Jerry Linenger, Cdr USN, MD, PhD
 Dr. Richard Linnehan, Capt USA, DVM
 Michael Lopez-Alegria, LtCdr USN
 Dr. Scott Parazynski, MD
 Winston Scott, Cdr USN
 Steven Smith, NASA-JSC
 Joseph Tanner, NASA-JSC
 Dr. Andrew Thomas, PhD
 Dr. Mary Weber, PhD 
Pilots 
 Dr Scott Horowitz, Capt USAF, PhD
 Brent Jett, Jr, LtCdr USN
 Kevin Kregel, NASA-JSC
 Kent Rominger, LtCdr USN
 

____________________________________________
|Current STS status:                       |
|Orbiters               Location   Mission |
|                                          |
|OV-102 Columbia        OPF Bay 3  STS-50  |
|OV-103 Discovery       OPF Bay 2  Mod     |
|OV-104 Atlantis        OPF Bay 1  STS-46  |
|OV-105 Endeavour       LC39B      STS-49  |
|                                          |
|ML/SRB/ET/OV stacks                       |
|                                          |
|ML1/                                      |
|ML2/STS-49/ET/OV-105   LC39B              |
|ML3/STS-50             VAB Bay 3          |
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Key: 
ET  External Tank
LC  Launch Complex
ML  Mobile Launcher
OPF Orbiter Processing Facility
OV  Orbiter Vehicle
SRB Solid Rocket Boosters
VAB Vehicle Assembly Building

 .-----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
 |  Jonathan McDowell                 |  phone : (617) 495-7176                |
 |  Harvard-Smithsonian Center for    |                                        |
 |   Astrophysics                     |                                        |
 |  60 Garden St, MS4                 |                                        |
 |  Cambridge MA 02138                |  inter : mcdowell@cfa.harvard.edu      |
 |  USA                               |                                        |
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