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SPACE CHRONICLE A BRITISH INTERPLANETARY SOCIETY PUBLICATION

Vol. 72 No.1 2019

SPUTNIK: NEW INSIGHTS

SELECTING SubscriberCHINA’S copy

What postcards SOVIET tell us about BLOK DM ’s space UPPER programme STAGES

ISBN 978-0-9567382-2-6 FEBRUARY 20191 Submitting papers to From the editor

SPACE CHRONICLE IN THIS SUPPLEMENTARY ISSUE OF Space Chronicle, four very different papers from the Society’s popular Sino-Russian Technical Forum are featured. Space Chronicle welcomes the submission These papers not only supplement the presentations delivered at the Forum, but for publication of technical articles of general also reflect the work of dedicated researchers from across the globe in recording interest, historical contributions and reviews the development in the Russian and Chinese space programmes. in space science and technology, astronautics and related fields. In the first article, Andrew Thomas investigates the fascinating and intricate network of Chinese space philately – post cards and celebratory envelopes that GUIDELINES FOR AUTHORS appear during significant events in the Chinese space programme, and the direct link to the leading space facilities that support it. ■ As concise as the content allows – typically 5,000 to 6,000 words. Shorter In the second paper, Phillip Clark examines the more recent of the papers will also be considered. Longer Russian Blok DM family of upper stages, updating his earlier paper on the subject papers will only be considered in presented in 1999 – the 50th anniversary of the inaugural of the four-stage exceptional circumstances and, at the K vehicle using the version as a fourth stage. This updated paper discretion of the Editor, may be split into includes operational details of the Blok DM family of upper stages from 1999 parts. through 2017. ■ Source references should be inserted in In the third article, Bert Vis returns to the subject of the Chinese space the text in square brackets [X] and then programme. He provides a reflective analysis of the selection of China’s first two listed at the end of the paper. groups of astronauts – or hangtianyuans – in 1997 and 2010, and, as members of ■ Illustration references should be cited in the original selection retire from active flight status, the prospect of the selection numerical order in the text as ‘Fig.X’; those of a new third group to fill the void. not cited in the text risk omission. The fourth and final paper in this edition presents new insights into the ■ Captions must be labelled with their Fig. development of the world’s first , “”, and how the original complex number and should be as short as possible. design chosen as the first Soviet satellite took longer to develop than originally ■ Illustrations should be: envisaged. To enable the USSR to be the first nation to place a satellite in Earth – colour or mono, but should be as close orbit, a far smaller, simpler design was authorised as a replacement. On October to print resolution (300 dpi) as possible. 4, 1957, Sputnik became the world’s first artificial satellite, while its more complex – poor-quality illustrations may predecessor finally flew as the third Soviet satellite seven months later. The compromise the acceptance of paper for original research into this story by Lyubov Vershinina has been translated for publication. Space Chronicle by Bart Hendrickx. – images embedded in Word documents may be acceptable, but the Editor reserves Continuing the tradition of archiving details of the BIS Sino-Russian Technical the right to request separate files Forums, this edition closes with an update of the papers delivered over the last from the author prior to publication. three Forums, updating the in-depth article presented by the Editor in the 2016 special edition of Space Chronicle. ■ Responsibility for copyright clearance rests entirely with the author. David J. Shayler, FBIS ■ Submission of papers for consideration Guest Editor and Coordinator of the 2019 BIS Sino-Russian Technical Forum should be sent by email to chronicle@ bis.space.com as a Word document or editable PDF file, along with any separate imageSubscriber files. copy ■ If a paper is accepted for publication, the author will be asked to sign a License to Publish form. This can be downloaded at www.bis-space.com/wp-content/ uploads/2012/08/WebsiteLicense.pdf Authors will receive a complimentary copy of the issue in which their paper appears. Editor John Becklake Production MP3 Media Promotion Gill Norman Office BIS, Arthur C. We respectfully ask authors to adhere Clarke House, 27-29 South Lambeth Road, London, SW8 1SZ, UK to these guidelines. Failure to do so will Telephone +44 (0)20 7735 3160 Email [email protected] Website www.bis-space.com result in the delay of acceptable papers for Distribution Space Chronicle is distributed worldwide by mail and may be received by annual publication. subscription or purchase of single copies. It is available through membership of the British Interplanetary Society at much reduced rates. Subscription details for members, non-members Our full Guidelines for Authors can be and libraries are available from the above address. downloaded from www.bis-space.com Space Chronicle is a publication that promotes the mission of the British Interplanetary Society. Opinions expressed in signed articles are those of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editor or the Council of the British Interplanetary Society. Security clearance, where necessary, is the responsibility of the author. Published by the British Interplanetary Society. Registered Company No: 402498. Registered FRONT COVER (1) Inside ; (2) Chinese Charity No: 250556. Printed by Latimer Trend, Estover Road, Plymouth, PL6 7PY, England. ; (3) cutaway of the Blok © 2019 British Interplanetary Society. No part of this publication may be reproduced or DM-SL used for the programme; and (4) transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or a posted cover commemorating the Chinese space recording by any information storage or retrieval system without prior permission from the programme. Publishers. SPACE CHRONICLE A BRITISH INTERPLANETARY SOCIETY PUBLICATION

Vol. 72 No.1 2019 Contents

3 SOCIAL NETWORKS FOUND Within Chinese Space Events Andrew Thomas

9 FLIGHTS OF THE BLOK DM FAMILY UPPER STAGES 1999-2017 Phillip S. Clark

25 SELECTING CHINA’S ASTRONAUTS Bert Vis

28  THE PATH TO THE FIRST SPUTNIK New Insights Subscriber Lyubov Vershinina (trans. Bart Hendrickx) copy 35 THE BIS SINO-RUSSIAN TECHNICAL FORUM David J. Shayler

OUR MISSION STATEMENT The British Interplanetary Society promotes the exploration and use of space for the benefit of humanity, connecting people to create, educate and inspire, and advance knowledge in all aspects of astronautics.

1 Contributors

Andrew Thomas is a member of the BIS, a creative writer and a radio “ham” who has spoken with Jean-Pierre Haigneré aboard and organised an ARISS contact between Leicester schoolchildren and the ISS in April 2003. In 2010 he completed an MA thesis entitled “Kultura Kosmosa: the Russian Popular Culture of ”. Now in retirement, he has joined the Department of Politics at de Montfort University, Leicester, where he is working on a PhD with the working title “Popular Participation in Space Exploration in China and its Mediation to Soft Power”.

Phillip S. Clark presented a paper at the very first Technical Forum in 1980 and traditionally has delivered the final presentation at of the subsequently meetings. Since 1969 Phil has focused on Soviet/ Russian and Chinese , and has been a space consultant for many years. The author of the popular 1988 book The Soviet Manned Space Programme he has regularly published papers in JBIS and SpaceFlight.

Bert Vis lives in The Hague, Netherlands, where he works for the local fire service. His interest in spaceflight history started with the launch of -7 in 1968 and he has followed the manned spaceflight efforts ever since. Concentrating on the Soviet/Russian and Chinese manned space programs in the past two decades, he has co-authored five books on spaceflight history and written dozens of articles for magazines such as Spaceflight and Space Chronicle..

Bart Hendrickx is a long-time observer of the Soviet/Russian space programme and has regularly written on the programme’s history for British Interplanetary Society publications during the last twenty years. He is also co-author, with Bert Vis, of the book Energiya-Buran: The Soviet , published by Springer/Praxis in 2007. Since the beginning of 2015, he has acted as Executive Secretary of the Belgian branch of the Society. Subscriber copy

Guest editor

David Shayler joined the Society in January 1976, became an Associate Fellow in 1983 and a Fellow in 1984. He attended his first forum in 1983, has presented regularly since then, and from 2012 became Coordinator and Co-Chair of the event. He created Astro Info Service in 1982 to focus his research and writing and was elected to the BIS Council in 2013. David is the author of more than 26 titles on , including cooperative works on the era and with the late Rex Hall, and the Cosmonaut Training Center with Rex and Bert Vis. He is currently working on an update to his Soyuz book and a history of Russian space stations planned for 2021 – the 50th anniversary of Salyut. (www.astroinfoservice.co.uk)

2 Space Chronicle, Vol. 72, pp.3-8, 2019

Social Networks Found Within Chinese Space Events

ANDREW THOMAS MA FBIS

Launches and other mission events occur in a displacement of study of communication. earthbound time and space. One way to make sense of them lies in the actions of communication organised by national 2. Epistemology and Methodology postal administrations and membership philatelic societies, who issue postage stamps, postcards and celebratory envelopes or “covers”. This occurs in modern China in materials issued In his oevre Envois, [3] which Miller [4] considers (p.40) as a both by China Post and by national, local or work-based phil- “so-called post-modern novel”, Jacques Derrida (1930-2004), atelic societies. considers the act of communication within a postal system of the sending of a postcard. Derrida remarks variously on the public Many of the covers in this study originate from facilities of nature of the face of a postcard (and therefore of its contents), and the Chinese space programme. By sampling the postal codes considers messages partially destroyed. Elmore [5] notes that (p. (zip codes) on commemorative covers which have been posted 60) Derrida “claims an epistemological privilege of the who over and received through the national postal network, it is possi- the what”, i.e. he privileges the recipient of the postcard over the ble to draw “social networks” of senders and recipients who are content of the message written on it. in mutual communication. This is similar to the technique of “traffic analysis” applied here to postal items that have been As a post-modern novel, Envois may have another genre to be re-sold. assigned to it or indeed to any other “text you gloss, teach, read or interpret” [6]. Miller points out that the postcard itself, which As a demonstration of the technique, Chinese space–re- contains a falsehood in its key image, did actually exist, and he lated locations and networks are described in this study. One reproduces one which Derrida sent him. Derrida thus establishes network is Maritime in nature, and another within a First- principles of epistemology to include intentional messages, false- tier City, while other space-related communication links are hoods, and partial messages to be reconstructed, as well as public shown. These social networks layer human interaction on an knowledge of private communication. Set in a context of postal industry usually segmented by agency and professional disci- communication he draws on the whole panoply of postal offices, pline. They demonstrate social engagement in space explora- franking machines and delivery agents. tion within China, and can also act as a heuristic to find small employment clusters of space-related activity. Postcards and envelopes are material things and, if commem- orative, include the reproduction of an image: they resemble a 1. Introduction photograph that can be handled. Considering this materiality, SubscriberEdwards [7] describes thecopy material nature of processed photo- The primary question addressed by this paper is this: can a dis- graphs as objects of affect. She notes that “photographs are objects course about space exploration be demonstrated in China? To specifically made to have social biographies” [8). She adds that answer it, previous papers [1] [2] have demonstrated that texts [9] “photographs have divergent, nonlinear, social biographies (including words and images) about space exploration exist in spread over divergent multiple material originals and multiple, China and have been transformed into a narrative of particular dispersed and atomized performances”. Here, the material object characteristics. But what is the process of this transformation? of a photograph is a participant in a performance. Asking rhetor- How is the narrative produced into the discourse? This paper is ically [10] “Why do photographs as ‘things’ matter for people?” an empirical study of a process of communication about space she refers to a model in which the photograph is a set in “a fluid exploration in China. set of productive relationships” in which the “material properties are themselves signifying properties” [11]. A material photograph Secondary questions consider the parties to the communica- is therefore a signifier within a network of relationships. tion and whether these parties are known and in known relation to each other or whether the patterns of communication which Dicati [12] presents a philatelic survey of Earth exploration have been discovered yield some other meaning about the nature from space. His raw material is the illustrated commemorative of space exploration within Chinese society. postage stamp and the “cover” – an envelope which has been post- marked on the day of a specific event. His book is not “an atlas of The paper is based on over two hundred samples of commem- space exploration based on postage stamps instead of the usual orative envelopes which each have a record of sender and recipi- illustrations” [13] but presents “hundreds of samples of postal ent. The envelopes are available for sale on international auction documents of each category that, since 70 years, tell the history sites and samples have been purchased. The identity of neither of space exploration”[14]. This is not, therefore, a history of space sender nor recipient is revealed in the study, but the postal code exploration illustrated by postage material, but a history written (zip code) of both, and the link created, acts as the basis of this by and through the texts and images from the postal system.

3 Andrew Thomas

A catalogue of Chinese space philately items, presented to the not a special issue, (in this example the stamp is pre-printed) and 47th Conference of the International Astronautic Federation held so the emphasis lies not with the stamp but with the occasion in in 1996 [15] explains that “to propagate our country’s and the date. The identity of the recipient (addressee) has been space achievements and commemorate space launching and the removed from this example, but two postal codes (zip codes) are great events in connection with aerosopace, the competent de- present, along with an image of the space programme. The six partments in China have issued many space philatelic items, such digit number on the lower left of the image is the sender’s post- as (memorial) cover, cards, aerogram postmark, etc, of which code (214431), and the six digit number on the top left is that of quite a few are uniquely designed and exquisitely manufactured the area including the recipient (214433). The study uses image and become treasure to philatelists”. Thus, postal items are pro- faces of postcards and envelopes. duced specifically to commemorate space exploration in China and to propagate it. Travers and Milgram [22], using the postal system, generated “acquaintance chains” between people intermediary to a starting Kopytoff [16], remarking on the “cultural biography of things”, person and a target person, establishing empirically the mean notes that “there is clearly a yearning for singularization in com- number of link people between any other two people, in what he plex societies… sometimes the yearning assumes the proportions call the “Small World Problem”. Granvotter [23] considers weak of a collective hunger…there is a continuing appeal in stamp col- ties between individuals, and in responding to comments on his lecting – where, one may note the stamps are preferably cancelled paper he writes [24] “Networks are, of course, only a necessary, ones so there is no doubt about their worthlessness in the circle of rather than a necessary and sufficient, condition for the level of -or commodities for which they were originally intended” [17]. Thus ganization needed to achieve some political goal”, and in so doing the postal item that has been in circulation has no other postal he shows the importance of these networks to social organisation. function, but retains its commemorative and celebratory ones. Sociograms showing weak and strong networks between in- Swidler [18], in commenting on American children, observes dividuals are drawn figures from a technique formerly known as that [19]”…when [they] choose group activities,…they partici- “traffic analysis”. This is a technique used in modern warfare and pate in ritual practices that reinforce voluntarist individualism”. intelligence to determine a structure, usually that of an enemy The choice to participate send and receive these commemorations army, from the interchange of messages, usually intercepted by is an act of individualism, or personal distinction from others. radio, without knowledge of the content of the message, which is usually secured by cryptography. Sparrow [25] calls it “network Posting the item leaves a trail in which is recorded a network analysis” and applies it to criminal intelligence by bodies engaged of people who have participated in this commemoration and cel- in the enforcement of law. For him, central questions include ebration. This is a social network, a network of people or social “who is central in this organization?” and “what role or roles does actors where individuals are interconnected. According to Was- a specific individual play?” [26]. serman and Faust [20] (p. 5), in social network analysis “the unit copy of analysis is not the individual, but an entity consisting of a col- To sum up, then, this study uses materials, whose meaning is lection of individuals and the linkages between them”. The con- of commemoration of space exploration, that have been distribut- nections of individuals may be shown in a sociogram, [21] or like ed along a social network or networks in China; the distribution that of Figure 3 opposite. has ceased and the trace of the entry and exit points of the act of distribution have been recorded, and will be drawn together in Therefore, this paper looks at the network revealed by the sociograms to show these networks. transfer of the material commemoration through the postal sys- tem, and does not consider the content of the text conveyed, ex- 3. Social networks of Space Exploration in China cept insofar as it categorises the commemoration as being related to Chinese space exploration. SubscriberCommemorations are organised by China Post, by organisa- Figure 1 below is a reproduction of a typical commemorative tions that are formally part of the Chinese space programme, and postcard used in this study. There is an ordinary postage stamp, by individuals. A website dedicated to the creation and exchange

Fig. 1 A commemorative postcard sent from postal code 214431 to 214433.

4 Social Networks Found Within Chinese Space Events

Fig. 2 A posted cover sent from an individual person near the site of the Observatory. of these commemorations is organised around a blog at http:// a particularly dense network, with many lines referring back to www.htjyw.cn. The website is refreshed almost daily, and in it source nodes. Therefore a set of smaller networks was examined can be found comments from and purchases by individuals who and explained below. have designed and printed commemorative covers for launches and conferences and had them stamped at the location, such as The first network is Maritime in nature. By consulting the web- the post office at the launch site, on the day of the event. These sites of China Post, Node 214429 is discovered to be the postal code commemorations are sold on a micro shop based around a smart- of the berth of the Tracking, and Control (TT&C) ships phone application. at Jiangyin [27]. These are the “Yuanwang” series ships. The Government’s Central intelligence Agency (CIA) identified This study is based on a total of 265 postcards and covers com- this as the “probable” base of the tracking ships in 1983 [28]. memorating events in space exploration, which had been sent and received within China, and were offered for sale between Septem- Figure 4 shows connections from this node. ber 2017 and January 2018. Two main suppliers sold the items, one based in China and one in the USA. Whilst a sample was purchased copy from each supplier, their offer for sale included a downloadable photograph of the item where (in most cases) both the postal code of origin and of receipt were visible. These items were only one component of the range of philatelic items offered for sale.

Some of the postal items may have been duplicated or re-of- fered for sale, but including this repetition would only alter the weight of the connection, not its existence.

Covers in this study might have been sent by individuals, by the ChinaSubscriber Post, by the national or local philatelic societies, or by individuals. In Figure 2 above, the Chinese text of the cover is copied into and further translated into English. It shows that the cover was sent neither by China Post nor the Astronomi- Fig. 3 Sociogram of Chinese postal codes in the commemora- cal Organisation but by an individual person. tion of Chinese space events. Node numbers are postal codes, and the thickness of lines refers to the frequency of connection. The sample of covers was analysed as follows. A two-column file of Comma Separated Variables (.csv) was prepared and loaded into the free programme Gephi. While column “a” was the sender, and column “b” the recipient, the resulting sociogram does not privilege one or the other.

Figure 3 (right) shows the most complex sociogram obtained. It is difficult to follow the connections between all nodal points in Figure 3, and so, using the graphics device available, smaller net- works are drawn where a particular postal code acts as the linking node. Where no code is given, the node is not numbered. In these subsequent Figures, the analysis of networks looks at the location of the postal code (sender and recipient) in China.

By a quick look at Figure 3 can be seen that there are a few nodes where three or more links are made, and some of these link Fig. 4 Connections from Node 214431, the Yuanwang berth at to secondary nodes of a small number of contacts, but it is not Jiangyin.

5 Andrew Thomas

Fig. 5 Centred on the Hángtiān building, Shanghai. Fig. 6 Centred on Daxing, Beijing.

This is the strongest network displayed, in that it has the most where environmental and meteorological institutes are based. examples in the sample. According to the sociogram of Figure 4, the berth in Jiangyin links to the headquarters of the China Space As capital city, Beijing offers a number of networks. For exam- Maritime Tracking Service in the main port there (214431)[29], ple, in Figure 6 can be seen the links offered to Node 100076 in to an industrial estate a few miles south of the port (214442) [30], Daxing, Beijing, which contains a number of research institutions and also to the Northern port of Yantai [31], where the North- including the Beijing Institute of Technology, Aeronautics and ern Fleet of the China Rescue and Salvage organisation is based. Space Science. During 2017, this fleet was active in the training in sea rescue techniques of astronauts from China and Europe [32]. In Figure 7 below can be seen the various interconnections of- fered to the Jiaquan launch centre at Node 732750 [33]. As with A second small network is that of Figure 5 (above). This is a each one of the diagrams the reader may use the node number small network in Shanghai centred on Node 200235 which is the with a keyword such as “Space”, “launch” or “satellite” to discover Post Office on the Hángtiān building (Space building) in Shang- locations of or manufacture in China. hai. This social network extends across the city to postal zones In Figure 8 can be seen a link between nodes 615031 at Xichang and 830034 outside Wūlŭmùqí (Urumqi). The postmark on the postcard from 830034, a sitecopy of a radio-telescope which is part of the Very long base Interferometer, is distinctive in that it is written both in the Mandarin characters (Hànzì) and in the Arabic script of the language Uiyghur. It represents Han influence in Xinjiang.

Finally, Figure 9 shows a connection between Nodes 615606 (the Xichang launch centre) and 836000, which is a new and small city called Beitun in Xinjiang provice. 4. Discussion SubscriberFrom the connection matrix, which is the CSV file, the full soci- ogram will yield many examples of networks. In the examples of Figures 4-8, connections have been shown between sites known

Fig. 7 Connections to Node 732750, the Jiaquan Launch Centre.

Fig. 9 Links from the Xichang satellite Launch Centre 615606, Fig. 8 Link to Wūlŭmùqí (Urumqi) 830034. including link to Beitun in Xinjiang province, 836000.

6 Social Networks Found Within Chinese Space Events to be within the Chinese space programme and a variety of other Finally, the networks show the Chinese space progamme at installations, doubtless including private residences. work. The networks extend across China, even into the Northern/ Western provinces, where under the “One Belt One Road” pro- These sociograms can serve as heuristic for new networks with- gramme the Beidou satellite system is to be extended [35]. in the Chinese space programme. For example, there is an obvious maritime connection between ships at sea tracking , and 5. Conclusion ships at sea participating in rescue and training missions, but apart from this maritime connection there is no direct industrial con- This paper demonstrates one process within China of celebration nection within the space programme. Yet as Travis and Milgram’s and commemoration of the Chinese space programme. It also work suggests, it is a small world of acquaintance chains between conveys the national extent of the process, including not only es- the berth at Jiangyin and the berth at Yantai. tablished sites and large cities but regions to the North and West.

Some of the postal codes are found to be the locations of in- The technique of social network analysis also acts as a heuris- dustrial or research zones. Here, if ethics considerations were to tic to find sites of Chinese research and industrial capacity for the permit, the line of address might locate individual companies and space programme. Finally, these social networks offer a source of organisations who contribute to the Chinese space programme, potential new recruits to the programme. although this further step was not taken in this study. Acknowledgements Equally, small, personal networks exist within cities (Figure 5 shows one inside Shanghai) and between institutions across the This paper was prepared with the support of my PhD supervisors, country (Figures 6-9). We can speculate that some of these links Drs Jonathan Rose and Steven Griggs, of the Department of Poli- will represent celebrations and commemorations by colleagues tics and Public Policy, de Montfort University, Leicester, England. within the space programme, perhaps from the launch site to an- Staff at the Confucius Institute at DMU helped by correcting my other tracking station or control room, as the postal codes suggest. raw translations. The Kettering Stamp and Philatelic Society were Some of them may leave the people on the space programme to interested in my study and gave me valuable insight. I am grateful their friends and relatives at their home or place of work – school for all support I have received, and any errors or omissions are or bank or shop. solely my responsibility.

References 1. Thomas, A (2017): Popular Participation in Space Exploration in 17. Kopytoffop. cit., page 80. China and its Mediation to Soft Power. Space Chronicle, 70 (1) pp. 18. Swidler, A (2001): Whatcopy Anchors Cultural practices. In : Scatzki TR; 9-16 Cetina KK, and van Savigny, E: The Practice Turn in Contemporary 2. Thomas, A (2018): Monumental Statues to Local Living Cosmonauts Theory. Routledge, pp74-92 Space Chronicle, 71 (1) pp. 13-17 19. Swidler, op. cit., p. 90. 3. Derrida, J (1987, trans. A Bass): The Post Card. University of Chicago 20. Wasserman, S and Faust, K (1994): Social Network Analysis; methods Press. and applications. Cambridge University Press. 4. Miller, J Hillis (2017): Glossing the Gloss of “Envois” in The Post 21. ibid., page 74. Card. In: van Gerven Oei, VWJ (ed): Going Postcard: the Letters of 22. Travers, J and Milgram S (1969): An Experimental Study of the Jacques Derrida. Punctum books., pp11-41. Small World Problem. Sociometry 32 pp 425-443 5. Elmore, R (2017): Troubling Lines: The Process of Address in 23. Granvotter, MS (1973): The Strength of weak ties.American Journal Derrida’s The Post Card. In: van Gerven Oei, VWJ (ed): Going Subscriberof Sociology vol. 78 1360-1380; and Commentary and Debate: Postcard: the Letters of Jacques Derrida. Punctum books., pp 59-63 Granvotter Replies to Gans. Vol 80 pp 527-531) 6. Miller, op.cit p. 39 24. ibid, p. 527 7. Edwards, E (2012): Objects of Affect: Photography Beyond the 25. Sparrow, MK (1991): the application of network analysis to criminal Image. Annu. Rev. Anthropol 41: 221-34 intelligence: An assessment of the prospects. Social Networks 13 pp 8. Edwards, op.cit p. 222 251-274 9. ibid p 223 26. ibid. p. 252. 10. ibid p 224 27. https://baike.baidu.com/item /8633606?fr=aladdin 11. ibid p 223-4 28. https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA- 12. Dicati, R (2017): Stamping the Earth from Space. Springer. RDP91T00712R000200340005-0.pdf 13. ibid., p. v 29. Interested readers may use the postal code as a search term in 14. ibid., p. xxiii google scholar where authors are indexed in the paper title such as: http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-ZGXJ200603005. 15. Cuī Jiànpíng et.al (1996): (Zhōngguó htm Characteristics analysis on spacecraft TT&C ship swaying data Hángtiān Yóu pĭn tú lù ). Beijing: National Industry Publishing LI Xiao-yong,ZHANG Zhong-hua,ZHANG Tong-shuang,KANG House. See page x. De-yong(China Satellite Maritime Tracking and Controlling 16. Kopytoff, I (1986): The cultural biography of things: Department,Jiangyin 214431,China) commoditization as process. In: Appadurai, A (ed): The Social life of 30. http://www.kinematicsmfg.com/contact/ (select address in China) things: Commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge University press. 31. https://www.searoutes.com/ports?name=Yantai&locode=CNYNT

7 Andrew Thomas

32. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/m/shandong/yantai/2017-08/24/ 3. Lianghe Central School, Guang’an, Sichuan 638509, China content_31043572.htm 34. see for example: http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL- 33. see for example: http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL- DDYH200404015.htm Overproof Analysis of Corresponding Water JSGG201125030.htm Association of information in security for Green Tetroxide Liu Zaihua, Liu Yanying (XiChang alerts fusion environment. LIU Jing 1,2,LIU Jianwei1,ZHANG Satellite Launch Center, XiChang, 615606) Tielin2,CHEN Jianhua2,LIU Yucun3 35. BeiDou navigation to cover Belt and Road countries by 2018 Source: 1.School of Electronic and Information Engineering, Beihang Xinhua 2017-09-13 http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2017- University, Beijing 100191, China 09/13/c_136606478.htm 2. Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, Jiuquan, Gansu 732750, China

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8 Space Chronicle, Vol. 72, pp.9-24, 2019

FLIGHTS OF THE BLOK DM FAMILY UPPER STAGES 1999-2017

PHILLIP S. CLARK

The year 2017 marks the fiftieth anniversary of the first flight of references where appropriate are given in this source. the four stage Proton-K vehicle using the Blok D as the fourth stage. This paper continues the analysis of a paper presented in The original Blok D was drawn upon the experiences of devel- 1999, and looks at the launch profiles of the Blok DM family oping the Blok L upper stage for the Molniya/Molniya-M launch of upper stages since the earlier paper was written. As well as vehicle and the third stage of the GR-1 missile: although the GR-1 reviewing the flights atop the three-stage Proton vehicles, this was paraded in Red Square in the mid-1960s and misidentified in paper also reviews the use of the Blok DM-SL on the -3SL the West as being the SS-10 missile, the programme was cancelled Sea Launch missions. before any flights took place.

1 Introduction The Blok D was originally intended (as the “D” designator in- dicates, the fifth letter in the Cyrillic alphabet) as the fifth stage A previous paper has reviewed the launches involving the four- of Korolyov’s N-1 booster which was intended to carry cosmo- stage Proton-K vehicle through the 1999 [1]. This paper continues nauts - one at a time - to the surface of the in the L-3 pro- the review of missions flown by the Blok DM family of upper stag- gramme. Although carried on three of the N-1 vehicles which es which continue through to the present time. The last flight in were launched, the Blok D never actually operated in this role the Blok D family was in 1996. since none of the N-1 payloads reached Earth orbit.

It is appropriate that this paper should be presented at the Brit- On the N-1 lunar mission the Blok D would have performed lu- ish Interplanetary Society’s 2017 Technical Forum reviewing the nar orbit injection and thencopy after separation of the Lunniy Orbitalny Soviet/Russian (and Chinese) space programmes because the first Korabl (LOK - the “lunar Soyuz”) it would have been used for the flight of the original Blok D took place on March 10, 1967 - 50 descent burn, taking the Lunniy Korabl (LK - “lunar ”) out of years ago. and burning until separation 1.5-2 km above the Moon. At this point the LK would separate and perform the final landing. When the previous paper was prepared the planned to phase out the use of the Blok DM class upper stages used on In 1965 the Blok D was drafted into a different piloted lunar Proton-K vehicles for commercial launches and replace them with programme which would bring together the three-stage Proton-K the more capable -M atop the up-rated Proton-M vehicle. The , developed by the Chelomei bureau, and the Blok D failure of a Blok DM3 on the flight in November 2002 and a stripped-down variant of Soyuz from the Korolyov bureau to resulted in the immediate retirement of the Blok DM family for form the L-1 programme. In this scenario the three stage Proton-K commercialSubscriber International Launch Services missions and all future would be sub-orbital and the Blok D would initially perform low commercial launches have used the Proton-M/Briz-M vehicle. The earth orbit (LEO) injection, followed about an hour later by a sec- Briz-M missions will be the subject o a separate paper [2]. ond burn to place the Blok D and L-1 spacecraft with two cosmo- nauts on a free-return circumlunar trajectory. After trans-lunar In 1999, as the previous paper was being prepared for publica- injection (TLI) the L-1 spacecraft would separate from the Blok tion, launches had only just started of the Sea Launch Zenit-3SL D. Launches in this programme took place during 1967-1970 with vehicle which used the Blok DM-SL as a third stage, primarily for the five spacecraft launched on deep space missions being desig- launches to a geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO). These mis- nated -8. sions will be reviewed in detail in this paper. Essentially the same launch vehicle configuration and mission Additionally, this paper will look at the other, primarily domes- profile were used to launch the third generation Luna missions tic, flights of the Proton-K and later Proton-M with the Blok DM during 1969-1976 and the missions in 1969-1973. An im- variants during the period 1999-2017. proved Blok D-1 fourth stage was introduced in 1975 and was used for the launches until 1984, as well as for the launches 2 Historical Summary of the Blok D Family of the and astronomical satellites through to 1989. A further improvement, the Blok D-2 was used for the two Fobos The details provided here summarise the historical details of the launches in 1988 (using a slightly modified launch profile) and the Blok D and its derived upper stages which were give in [1]: full Mars 8 mission in 1996 (see Figure 1 and Table 1).

A modified upper stage series designated Blok DM was intro- duced in 1974 when the started to launch payloads This paper was first presented at the British Interplanetary Society Sino- to . The three-stage Proton-K would place Russian Technical Forum in London on 4 June 2015. the fully-laden Blok DM with its payload into LEO with an in-

9 Phillip S. Clark

TABLE 1 Designators for Variants of the Blok D and Blok DM Families Basic Fourth Stage Derived Fourth Stage Second Generation Derivative Blok D 11S824 Blok D 11S86 Blok D-1 11S824M Blok DM-2 11S861 Blok D-2 11S824F Blok DM-5 (Not known) Blok DM-2M 11S861-01 Blok DM1 (Not known) Blok DM2 (Not known) Blok DM3 (Not known) Blok DM4 (Not known) Blok DM-SL (Not known) Blok DM-03 11S861-03 Blok DM-SLB (Not known) Note: The Table above shows the relationships between the different variants of the fourth stage: the relationships are also shown in the Russian Figure 1. Production code designators for the commercial fourth stages are not known. clination of 51.6 degrees: at the first through the ascending node after launch the Blok DM would ignite for the first time to place its payload into a GTO inclined at about 47-48 degrees to the equator and at apogee when passing through the descending node the Blok DM would ignite for a second time to place the satellite in a geosynchronous drift orbit with an inclination of 2 degrees or less: the satellite itself would perform a small orbital correction to enter geosynchronous orbit once it had reached its planned oper- ating longitude.

A minor modification of the Blok DM, designated DM-2, was introduced in 1982 for the launches of Uragan satellites which would comprise the GLONASS navigation satellite series. The in- itial launches would see launches to LEO at 51.6 degrees and then two burns of the Blok DM-2 at perigee and apogee of the transfer copy orbit would place the satellites in 65 degree orbits at about 19,100 km. In 1985 launches started to use an LEO with an inclination of 65 degrees, which required slightly lower parking orbits but the Fig. 1 Russian chart showing a cut-away of the basic Blok D Blok DM-2 carried less propellant because there were no propel- stage on the left and the relationship between the various deriv- lant-expensive orbital place changes. atives [3]. Since this chart refers to 247 launch successes it must have been compiled after the successful launch of DirecTV 7S The Blok DM-2 was also used for launches to GEO. on a Zenit-3SL in 2004. The upper stage variants are identified by their production codes, with the exception of the commer- A further modification of the Blok DM, the Blok DM-2M, was cial Blok DM variants in the right-hand column: Table 1 which introduced in 1994 and it last flew in 2005: it was used primarily accompanies this chart shows the names and production codes for launchesSubscriber to GEO, although it was also used once for the launch for the fourth stages. It should be noted that the Cyrillic “C” of three Uragan satellites. translates into English as “S”.

When the Russians decided to start flying commercial missions using the Proton-K with a Blok DM class fourth stage (see Section used for the commercial launches with satellites intended to reach 3), the commercial stages were modifications of the Blok DM- geosynchronous orbit. The launch of SESAT is an anomaly because 2M. However the Russians have not revealed the alpha-numer- the payload was a Russian designed and built satellite and used a ic production codes for these commercial variants: similarly the standard “domestic” launch profile with a “domestic” fourth stage, production codes have not been released for the Blok DM-SL(B) the Blok DM-2M. The Bloks DM1, DM3 and DM4 were variants stages which were used for the Sea Launch and pro- of the Blok DM fourth stage which were developed especially for grammes which paired the Blok DM variants with the two-stage the commercial launch programme (see Table 2 and Figure 1): the Zenit launch vehicle. Blok DM2 commercial variant was used for the three launches of Iridium satellite clusters in 1997-1998, and these three launches 3 Continued Commercial Flights of the Proton-K with are detailed in the original paper [4]. the Blok DM It is believed that the only differences between the Blok DM1, Commercial launches of the Proton-K launch vehicle with the DM2, DM3 and DM4 variants were in the control software and the Blok DM fourth stage started in 1996 with the flight of Astra 1F. adapters between the stage and the payloads. At the time of the earlier review [1] being prepared in July 1999 the commercial launches were continuing. Table 2 (opposite) is 3.1 Standard profile for commercial launches a complete list of the commercial launches with satellites which were intended to reach geosynchronous orbit. The commercial launches of the Proton-K with Blok DM fourth Table 1 shows that four different upper stage designations were stages used a different profile than seen on domestic launches to

10 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

TABLE 2 List of Commercial Launches Using the Blok DM Fourth Stages, 1996-2002

Launch Date Fourth stage Satellite Mass Satellite Platform Planned Orbital Data Modelled Orbital Data (kg)

Incl (deg) Perigee Satellite Incl (deg) Perigee Satellite (km) (dV m/s) (km) (dV m/s) 1996 Apr 8 Blok DM3 Astra 1F 3,010 HS-601 6.95 11,966 750 9.15 13,750 750 1996 Sep 6 Blok DM1 INMARSAT-3 2 1,144 AS-4000 2.72 36,244 20 2.81 36,325 15 1997 May 24 Blok DM4 5 3,650 FS-1300 17.60 6,459 1,240 17.79 6,650 1,245 1997 Aug 27 Blok DM3 PAS 5 3,720 HS-601HP 14.61 8,434 1,080 14.76 8,500 1,085 1997 Dec 2 Blok DM3 Astra 1G 3,379 HS-601HP 12.35 10,161 950 12.43 10,200 960 1997 Dec 24 Blok DM3 * AsiaSat 3 3,410 HS-601HP 13.00 9,500 995 13.21 9,625 1,005 1998 May 7 Blok DM3 EchoStar 4 3,478 A-2100AX 15.44 8,197 1,120 15.53 8,100 1,125 1998 Aug 30 Blok DM3 Astra 2A 3,635 HS-601HP 15.62 7,799 1,125 15.73 7,850 1,135 1998 Nov 4 Blok DM3 PAS 8 3,800 LS-1300 17.29 6,783 1,220 17.47 6,850 1,230 1999 Feb 15 Blok DM3 Telstar 6 3,763 FS-1300 17.37 6,638 1,230 17.71 6,750 1,240 1999 Mar 21 Blok DM3 AsiaSat 3S 3,465 HS-601HP 13.11 9,513 995 13.20 9,550 1,005 1999 May 19 Blok DM3 Nimiq 1 3,646 A-2100AX** 16.48 7,015 1,195 16.62 7,100 1,190 1999 Jun 18 Blok DM3 3,728 HS-601HP 16.37 7,341 1,175 16,50 7,400 1,175 1999 Sep 27 Blok DM3 LMI 1 3,740 A-2100AX** 17.40 6,513 1,230 17.52 6,600 1,240 2000 Feb 12 Blok DM3 Garuda 1 4,498 A-2100AX*** 16.72 6,234 1,150 18.58 7,550 1,145 2000 Apr 18 Blok DM-2M SESAT 2,500 MSS-727** 0.03 35,945 10 0.07 36,025 5 2000 Oct 2 Blok DM3 GE 1A 3.593 A-2100AX** 15.98 7,248 1,200 16.75 7,400 1,190 2000 Oct 13 Blok DM3 GE 6 3,909 A-2100AX** 18.68 5,972 1,295 18.66 5,975 1,295 2001 May 15 Blok DM3 PAS 10 3.772 HS-601HP 17.02 7,155 1,195 16.98 7,100 1,205 2001 Jun 16 Blok DM3 Astra 2C 3,643 HS-601HP 16.01 7,709 1,150 15.92 7,650 1,150 2002 Mar 30 Blok DM3 903 4,726 LS-1300HL*** 25.01 3,477 1,575 25.22 3.625 1,575 2002 May 7 Blok DM3 DirecTV 5 3,460 LS-1300 17.67 6,569 copy1,240 17.70 6,600 1,240 2002 Aug 22 Blok DM3 EchoStar 8 4.650 LS-1300*** 22.99 4,490 1,475 22.78 4,375 1,475 2002 Nov 26 Blok DM3 * Astra 1K 5,250 SB-3000B3S*** 26.30 3,343 1,620 26.44 3,375 1,620 NOTES • This is a complete listing of commercial launches using the Proton-K with a Blok DM fourth stage which were intended to carry satellites which were heading for a geosynchronous orbit. Launch failures and variations in the launch profiles are indicated, as shown below. The “planned orbital data” are the target orbit parameters of the satellite deployment orbit as released by International Launch Services: the “modelled orbital data” are the predicted deployment orbit data based upon the modelling described in [1]: in both cases, apogee is at geosynchronous orbit altitude. “dV m/s” are the planned and modelled velocity changes required by the satellite to reach a geosynchronous orbit. * In-orbit fourth stage failure ** changed between the low parking orbit and the geosynchronous transfer orbit ***FourthSubscriber stage performed LEO injection geosynchronous orbit. This was a result of the western satellites fourth stage would shed two stabiliaatsiii i obespecheniya zagotov- generally being significantly heavier that the Russian satellites leniya (SOZ) motors which briefly burned to settle the propellant launched to geosynchronous orbit in the “domestic” programme. before the second main burn at apogee: these motors are generally The heavier satellite masses meant that the commercial Proton-K referred to a “ullage motors” in the West. could not deliver the satellites to a geosynchronous orbit, but in- stead they were delivered to an orbit which was higher in altitude As previously noted, for commercial launches the GTO would than the traditional GTO (approximately 200-36,000 km): in this normally retain the 51.6 deg inclination of the original parking or- paper this is called the “deployment orbit”. bit. Also, the ullage motors remained attached to the fourth stage – this slightly increased the stage’s structural mass that was carried The standard commercial launch profile would see the third to the deployment orbit. stage of the Proton-K vehicle placing the fourth stage/satellite as- sembly in a – typically around 200 km altitude. The Analysis of the deployment orbit parameters showed that they fourth stage would then complete two manoeuvres: the first would were chosen to minimise the velocity change required by the sat- place itself and the satellite into a GTO which retained the original ellite to reach geosynchronous orbit [5], and the example of the orbital inclination of 51.6 deg. At the first pass through apogee the Telstar 5 launch was discussed in the earlier paper. fourth stage would fire once more to place the satellite into the deployment orbit. Compared with the GTO, the deployment orbit 3.2 Variations to the standard launch profile would have a reduced inclination and an increased perigee. In 1999 the first variation in the established commercial launch On a domestic launch the first burn of the fourth stage would profile was introduced with the launch of Nimiq 1. The first burn reduce the orbital inclination to 47-48 deg for the GTO and the of the fourth stage would reduce the orbital inclination of the

11 Phillip S. Clark

TABLE 3 Orbital Data for Selected Commercial Proton-K Launches with Geosynchronous Orbit Payloads Object Mass (kg) Orbital Incl (deg) Period (min) Perigee (km) Apogee (km) AoP (deg) 1 Standard Commercial Launch Profile [6] Proton-K third stage (8S812) 4,185 1999 Mar 21.3 51.59 88.25 158 21 272 Proton-K fourth stage casing 800? 1999 Mar 21.30 51.59 88.05 161 196 269 Proton-K fourth stage (Block DM3) 2,140 1999 Mar 21.06 51.48 635.10 205 35,989 1 1999 Mar 21.56 13.1 823.24 9,513 35,925 0 AsiaSat 3S 3,465 1999 Mar 21.28 13.23 827.58 9,652 35,990 0 2 Variation 1 - GTO Inclination Change [7] Proton-K third stage (8S812) 4,185 1999 May 21.11 51.60 88.25 157 219 271 Proton-K fourth stage casing 800? 1999 May 21.23 51.59 88.19 167 203 272 Proton-K fourth stage (Blok DM3) 2,140 1999 May 21.11 48.55 630.32 214 35,733 0 1999 May 21.75 16.48 66.56 7,015 35,719 0 Nimiq 1 3,646 1999 May 21.75 16.45 769.93 7,134 35,763 0 3 Variation 2 – Fourth Stage Performs Parking Orbit injection [8] Proton-K fourth stage (Blok DM3) 2,140 2000 Feb 12.4 ~51.6 ~88.5 ~180 ~220 - 2000 Feb 12.43 51.59 634.38 182 35,974 1 2000 Feb 12.92 16.72 755.14 6,234 35,949 0 Garuda 1 4,498 2000 Feb 13.00 16.71 758.79 6,366 35,993 0 4 Final Commercial Launch Using the Blok DM Family [9] Proton-K fourth stage (Blok DM3) 2,140 2002 Nov 26.20 51.57 88.19 176 193 166 Astra 1K 5,250 2002 Nov 26.20 51.57 88.04 172 183 261 NOTES: • The first three launches are chosen to illustrate the standard launch profile for the commercial Proton-K launches, together with the variant profiles which saw first the GTO inclination changed with the first burn of the fourth stage and then with the fourth stage performing parking orbit injection. For the latter variant the parking orbit data are based upon the planned orbit as announced by International Launch Services. The references given above are for the orbital data which are quoted. • AoP is the argument of perigee for the orbit. • If the Astra 1K mission had been successful, the pre-launch literature from International Launch Services indicatedcopy that the planned parking orbit was 51.6 deg, approximately 175.5 km circular. The Blok DM3 fourth stage would then perform a second burn to raise apogee to approximately 35,800 km and a third burn to the satellite deployment orbit 26.3 deg, 3,343-35,786 km.

GTO. This profile was used for five launches, as follows: perform parking orbit injection and then performing a plane change when entering GTO. Nimiq 1 initial inclination 51.60° GTO inclination 48.55° LMI 1 initial inclination 51.58° GTO inclination 48.57° 3.3 The final commercial Proton-K launch using a Blok DM SESAT initial inclination 51.64° GTO inclination 49.15° fourth stage GE 1A initial inclination 51.60° GTO inclination 48.54° GE 6 Subscriberinitial inclination 51.59° GTO inclination 48.75° The first launch vehicle failure in the commercial Proton-K pro- gramme came in December 1997 when the Blok DM3 failed to As previously noted, the SESAT launch is unusual because it used complete the planned apogee burn to place AsiaSat 3 in its planned a Russian-built satellite and used the “domestic” launch profile deployment orbit. The second failure almost five years later result- with a “domestic” fourth stage. ed in the end of commercial launches using the Blok DM family atop the Proton-K. A further innovation appeared with the launch of Garuda 1 in 2000 and this would be used for all of the commercial satellites Astra 1K was launched on November 26, 2002. The three stages which had masses in excess of four tonnes. The performance of of the Proton-K were sub-orbital, with the Blok DM3 performing the launch vehicle was maximised by having the three stages of parking orbit injection. The following orbital data were planned the basic Proton-K vehicle fly sub-orbital profiles, with the fourth for the mission [10]: stage performing parking orbit injection. The fourth stage would then perform two further burns in line with the standard commer- Initial parking orbit: 51.6° 175.5 km near circular cial launch profile, placing the satellite into its deployment orbit. Transfer orbit: 51.6° (altitudes not quoted) As well as Garuda 1, this launch profile variant was flown by -IN Deployment orbit: 26.3° 3,343-35,786 km TELSAT 903 and EchoStar 8, and it was also planned for the failed Astra 1K launch. The second burn of the Blok DM3 failed and the satellite was prematurely separated from the stage (see Table 4 and Figure Examples of these two launch profile variants, together with a 2). Some press reports suggest that the parking orbit was lower flight using the standard commercial profile, are given in Table 3. than planned, but a comparison of the pre-launch target altitude quoted above with the data derived from the Two-Line Orbital No missions were flown which combined these two variations Elements (173-182 km) shows that this is incorrect. However, in the commercial launch profile – that is, having the fourth stage when the time came for the fourth stage to re-ignite to enter the

12 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

TABLE 4 Orbital Data for the Astra 1K Launch

PRE-MANOEUVRE ORBIT POST-MANOEUVRE ORBIT

Orbital Orbital Orbital Perigee Apogee Angle of Orbital Orbital Orbital Perigee Apogee Angle of Epoch Inclination Period (km) (km) Perigree Epoch Inclination Period (km) (km) Perigree (°) (min) (°) (°) (min) (°)

2002 2002 2002-053A Astra 1K Initial orbit Nov 26.26 51.56 88.18 177 192 164 Nov 26.32 51.56 88.17 176 191 163 Nov 26.57 51.57 88.12 173 190 166 Nov 26.87 51.57 88.07 171 186 167 Nov 27.12 51.59 88.95 146 299 298 Nov 27.55 51.59 88.80 141 289 300 Nov 27.73 51.60 90.22 280 291 250 Nov 29.49 51.59 90.18 271 295 282 Nov 30.30 51.60 90.24 277 296 255 Dec 10.02 51.63 90.13 210 352 334 Final orbit to be catalogued 2002-053B Blok DM3 stage Nov 26.20 51.57 88.04 172 183 261 high-apogee transfer orbit, the engine failed. The satellite sepa- after the first burn. In the other, the contaminants clogged a rated in the parking orbit, deploying its solar panels, and subse- valve designed to supply fuel to the gas generator injector, caus- quently the unused propellant was vented from the fourth stage: ing the valve to leak. it seems likely that the satellite separation and propellant venting were governed by an on-board timer rather than being initiated Plans were already advanced for the Blok DM to be phased out by ground controllers. of commercial Proton-K launches, with its replacement being a new Briz-M stage which would make the four-stage Proton an “all Khru- A full investigation of the failure was conducted by the Russian nichev” vehicle – the Blok DM family was the product of the Energiya State Commission for the launch and it was concluded that [11]: company. This failure resulted in the remaining planned commercial The anomaly occurred at the start of the second Block DM launches using the Proton switching to the new Briz-M fourth stage main engine burn. There was excessive fuel in the main engine which had already be introduced for some launches. when it was ignited, which led to extraordinarily high tempera- As for Astra 1K, on December 10 SES Astra announced that the tures that destroyed the engine, the commission found. satellite had been de-orbited at 02.00 GMT (probably an approximate time), with debris falling over the Pacific Ocean in an area bounded by In the final report, the State Commission was unable to pin- 27-54 deg S and 133-174 degcopy W. point a single root cause for the failure. It identified two possible scenarios for the fuel build-up, both attributed to contamina- 4 Remaining Commercial Proton-K Launches Using tion that interfered with the normal operation of fuel metering the Blok DM Family components, resulting in excess fuel in the gas generator. There were four other commercial launches of the commercial Pro- In one scenario, “stray particles” clogged the manifolds ton-K with a Blok DM class fourth stage. Three of these were for Sir- throughSubscriber which fuel is drained from the starting-fluid feed line ius Radio and they used a new class of orbit for the launch vehicle: PHILLP S. CLARK PHILLP S.

Fig. 2 Graph showing the orbital evolution of the Astra 1K satellite after it had separated from the failed Blok DM3 stage in low Earth orbit. It will be noted that the satellite’s perigee altitude decreased with time while the apogee increased with time. The mean altitude remained almost constant after November 28, 2002. Orbital data derived from the Two-Line Orbital Elements.

13 Phillip S. Clark

TABLE 5 List of Other Commercial Launches Using the Blok DM Fourth States, 2000-2002

Launch Date Object Mass (kg) Orbital Epoch Incl. (deg) Period (min) Perigee (km) Apogee (km) AoP (deg) 1 Sirius-SR 1 launch [12] 2000 Jun 30 Proton-K third stage 4,185 Jun 30.94 64.85 87.74 155 171 275 (8S812) Proton-K fourth stage 800? Jul 1.11 64.84 87.40 142 149 9 casing Proton-K fourth stage 2,140 Jun 30.95 63.40 423.09 184 24,397 225 (Blok DM3) Jul 1.69 63.37 988.75 6,073 46,923 270 Sirius-SR 1 (LS-1300 3,800 Jul 1.00 63.37 995.08 6,163 47,114 270 platform) Jul 14.16 63.33 1,435.95 24,425 47,143 270 2 Sirius-SR 2 launch [13] 2000 Sep 5 Proton-K third stage 4,185 Sep 5.58 64.84 87.71 145 177 326 (8S812) Proton-K fourth stage 800? Sep 5.58 64.83 87.46 143 154 45 casing Proton-K fourth stage 2,140 Sep 5.48 63.36 994.47 6,194 47,056 270 (Blok DM3) Sirius-SR 2 (LS-1300 3,800? Sep 5.48 63.38 994.47 6,193 47,057 270 platform) Sep 18.65 63.35 1,435.95 24,597 46,971 270 3 Sirius-SR 3 launch [14] 2000 Nov 30 Proton-K third stage 4,185 Nov 30.85 64.83 87.97 166 182 52 (8S812) Proton-K fourth stage 800? Dec 1.01 64.84 87.55 140 166 29 casing Proton-K fourth stage 2,140 Nov 30.91 63.41 994.98 6,181 47,091 270 (Blok DM3) Sirius-SR 3 (LS-1300 3,800? Nov 30.91 63.39 995.04 6,183 47,092 270 platform) Dec 13.01 63.39 1,436.00 copy24,493 47,077 270 4 INTEGRAL launch [15] 2002 Oct 17 Proton-K third stage 4,185 Oct 17.38 51.57 93.22 199 666 83 (8S812) Proton-K fourth stage 800? Oct 17.51 51.55 93.42 205 679 84 casing Ullage motor (SOZ) 56? Oct 24.78 51.55 94.84 189 832 117 Ullage motor (SOZ) 56? Oct 24.63 51.60 94.51 189 801 106 Proton-K fourth stage 2,350? Oct 17.40 51.50 3,970.74 688 152,682 300 (Blok DM-2) SubscriberINTEGRAL 3,954 Oct 19.96 51.70 3,889.38 535 150,558 300 Oct 31.28 52.22 4,313.24 9,028 153,762 302 NOTES • The format of this Table follows that of Table 3, but with the addition of the launch dates. Also, the final operating orbits of the four satellites are shown since they did not enter standard geosynchronous orbits. the fourth launch was to a highly eccentric orbit for the European The three Sirius-SR launches were to low parking orbits with in- Space Agency. clinations of 64.8 degrees, with the third stage of the Proton-K enter- ing orbit. The first burn of the Blok DM3 stage placed the satellites in The three Sirius-SR* satellites were launched during a five months an orbit with an apogee of approximately 24,400 km, with the in 2000 and they introduced a new orbital regime for the com- inclination being changed to 63.3 degrees. As the Blok DM3 passed mercial Proton-K launches. The ~3,800 kg satellites were deployed in through apogee it performed a second burn to an approximately orbits with orbital periods close to1,436 minutes, but the orbits were 6,100-47,000 km orbit, where the satellite separated. The satellite then eccentric and at inclinations of 63.3 degrees (see Table 5). performed a burn to the operational 24,500-47,000 km orbit. Apo- gee was placed at the northern apex of the orbit, so that the satellites would linger close to apogee and therefore provide continuous cover- * These satellites were launched with the name “Sirius”, but this name age of the radio broadcasts within the United States. was already in use by the Swedish Sirius communications satellites Later launches of Sirius-SR satellites would use true geosynchro- in geosynchronous orbit. Therefore this author has designated the nous orbits which meant that from the United States they would be American satellites “Sirius-SR” (for Sirius Radio) to avoid confusion seen at a lower altitude above the horizon than the 63.3 degree incli- between the two unrelated satellites series. nation orbits provided.

14 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

INTEGRAL (INTErnational -Ray Astrophysics Labo- a Proton launch vehicle with a Blok DM fourth stage which were ratory) was a 3,954 kg science satellite launched for the European intended to reach geosynchronous orbit. The Blok DM launches Space Agency on October 17, 2002. The commercial arrangements were gradually being phased out as the improved Proton-M with did not involve International Launch Services. The satellite was the Briz-M fourth stage became operational. The launch of Cos- launched into an initial 199-666 km orbit (see Table 5) with the mos 2479 was the last launch of a Proton-K variant, although the third stage of the Proton-K performing orbital injection. As the Russians plan to continue flying occasional Blok DM missions us- satellite attached to the Blok DM-2 stage passed through apogee ing the Proton-M vehicle. the fourth stage performed a single manoeuvre to place the sat- ellite in a highly eccentric 535-150,558 km orbit. A small phasing The launch on September 6, 1999 was notable because for the manoeuvre was then completed by the fourth stage to a slightly first time that a single Proton-K was used to launch two satellites to higher orbit. a geosynchronous orbit: and Yamal 102. Of course there had been regular launches of three Uragan satellites to semi-syn- The identity of the fourth stage used for the INTEGRAL launch chronous orbits since 1982, but the Russians had never felt the has caused some confusion: the commercial Blok DM2 vs the “do- need to carry more than one payload to geosynchronous orbit at mestic” Blok DM-2. In response to an enquiry from this writer, In- once. The flight followed the standard profile to reach geosynchro- ternational Launch Services which markets the Proton launch ve- nous orbit, where the satellites were deployed in drift orbits with hicle family in the West, stated that the fourth stage was the DM-2 periods of 1,442 minutes: from that point they were independently [16], something which is apparently confirmed by the presence of stationed at their planned operational longitudes. separated ullage motors in orbit. The only other dual launch to geosynchronous orbit using a 5 Domestic Launches of the Blok DM Family Blok DM class upper stage was that of and in November 2003. Despite the Blok DM family of fourth stages being retired from the commercial Proton launch vehicle’s programme, variants During the period under review the only launch failure of a continued to be launched within the domestic space programme. payload intended for geosynchronous orbit came on October 27, The primary applications were the deployment of satellites to ge- 1999: 220 seconds into the flight one of the second stage engines osynchronous drift orbits and triplets of Uragan satellites in the caught fire and the launch vehicle debris crashed 25 km north-east GLONASS navigation satellite system to “semi-synchronous” or- of Atasu in the Karaganda Region. This was extremely embarrass- bits. In addition, in 2002 there was the second launch in the Ar- ing for the Russians because it meant that the launch of ’s aks-N programme. International module Zvezda had to be delayed be- cause that would use the three-stage Proton-K. 5.1 Launches to geosynchronous orbit A new Blok DM variantcopy was introduced within the Uragan pro- Table 6 provides a listing of all of the launches starting in 1999 of gramme in 2010, the Blok DM-03: as noted below the first two

TABLE 6 Geosynchronous Orbit Launches Using the Blok DM, 1999-2016

Launch Date Stage 4 Satellite(s) Launch Date Stage 4 Satellite(s)

Proton-K Launches

1999 Feb 28 DM-2 Raduga-1 4 1999 Sep 6* DM-2M Yamal 101-102 1999 Oct 27** DM-2 -A 1 2000 MarSubscriber 12 DM-2M Ekspress-A 2 2000 Jun 24 DM-2M Ekspress-A 3 2000 Jul 4 DM-2 Cosmos 2371 (Geizer) 2000 Aug 28 DM-2 Raduga-1 5 2001 Aug 24 DM-2 Cosmos 2379 (US-KMO) 2001 Oct 6 DM-2 Raduga-1 6 2002 Jun 10 DM-2M Ekspress-A 1R 2003 Apr 24 DM-2 Cosmos 2397 (US-KMO) 2003 Nov 24 DM-2M Yamal 201-202 2003 Dec 28 DM-2M Ekspress-AM 22 2004 Mar 27 DM-2 Raduga-1 7 2004 Apr 26 DM-2M Ekspress-AM 11 2004 Oct 29 DM-2M Ekspress-AM 1 2005 Mar 29 DM-2M Ekspress-AM 2 2005 Jun 24 DM-2 Ekspress-AM 3 2006 Jun 26 DM3 KazSAT 1 2008 Jun 26 DM-2 Cosmos 2440 (US-KMO) 2009 Feb 28 DM-2 Raduga-1 8 2012 Mar 30 DM-2 Cosmos 2479 (US-KMO)

Proton-M Launches 2015 Sep 14 DM-03 Ekspress-AM 8 NOTES • The satellite series for Cosmos launches is shown in parentheses: US-KMO is the early warning satellite system. * First launch of two satellites to geosynchronous orbit using the Proton-K vehicle. ** Proton-K failure to reach orbit.

15 Phillip S. Clark launches using this stage failed before the stage had a chance to fire. The first successful flight to geosynchronous orbit was atop the Proton-M variant in September 2015 with the payload being Ekspress-AM 8.

The Russians are planning further launches of the Proton-M with the Blok DM-03, although the partial Proton-M failure dur- ing the launch of INTELSAT 31 in June 2016 has meant long de- lays in the Proton launch schedule. The following uses of the Blok DM-03 are currently planned (and some might have taken place HENDRICKX BART BY TRANSLATION by the time that this paper is published):

2017 3 x Cosmos (Uragan) satellites Elektro-L 3 (might use the Briz-M) 2018 Spektr-RG 3 x Cosmos (Uragan) satellites 2019 -5M 1 2019-2020 Elektro-L 4 Fig. 3 The planned evolution of the new Blok DM-03 stage. The In addition, it is planned that the new -5 launch vehicle left-hand diagram shows the Phase 1 stage, in the middle the will fly some missions with the Blok DM-03 upper stage. Phase 2a stage and on the right the final Phase 2 stage [17]. The captions below the three rocket stage diagrams state that: 5.2 Launches of Uragan satellites “Left – introduction of the same modifications introduced in the Block DM-SLB”; “introduction of an extendible nozzle for Table 7 provides a listing of the GLONASS launches starting in 2000 the main engine”; “right– installation of the 11D58MF engine; (there was no launch in 1999): the programme has also used the replacement of the ullagе motor system by an auxiliary engine Briz-M fourth stage for launching satellites. A curiosity is that there system using non-toxic propellants. The title of the original have been regular launches during the western Christmas period. graphic translates as “Stages in the modernization of the 11S861-03 upper stage”. It will be noted in Table 7 that apart from one launch in 2002 using the Blok DM-2M, all of the Proton-K launches have used the ized?), and structural enhancements that will have to achieve 3.2 Blok DM-2 fourth stage. tonnes to GSO and 6 tonnescopy to GTO. A new Blok DM variant, the DM-03, was introduced in Decem- Phase II: adoption of RD-58MF [main engine] and a new RCS ber 2010 for the launch of three Uragan satellites. Development of that won’t use RG-1/LOX plus some other structural enhance- this stage was planned for three phases [18]: ment: 3.6 tonnes to GSO and 6.6 tonnes to GTO. Phase I version 1: augmented performance through increased tank volume. 3 tonnes to GSO, 5.5 tonnes to GTO. The first two launches of the Proton-M with the Blok DM-03 ended in failure before the time came for the fourth stage to oper- Phase I version 2: introduction of fairing type 14S75, diameter ate. After the December 5, 2010 launch failure the following was 4,350 mm, new electronics (if I translated correctly, unpressur- released by the Russians [19]: TABLE 7Subscriber GLONASS Launches Using the Blok DM, 1999-2016 Launch Date Stage 4 Satellites Launch Date Stage 4 Satellites Proton-K Launches

2000 Oct 13 DM-2 Cosmos 2374-2376 2001 Dec 1 DM-2 Cosmos 2380-2382 2002 Dec 25 DM-2M Cosmos 2394-2396 2004 Dec 26 DM-2 Cosmos 2411-2413 2005 Dec 25 DM-2 Cosmos 2417-2419 2006 Dec 25 DM-2 Cosmos 2424-2426 2007 Oct 26 DM-2 Cosmos 2431-2433 2007 Dec 25 DM-2 Cosmos 2434-2436 2008 Sep 25 DM-2 Cosmos 2442-2444 2008 Dec 25 DM-2 Cosmos 2447-2449 2009 Dec 14 DM-2 Cosmos 2456-2458 2010 Mar 1 DM-2 Cosmos 2459-2461 2010 Sep 2 DM-2 Cosmos 2464-2466 Proton-M Launches

2010 Dec 5** DM-03 Cosmos x 3 2013 Jul 2** DM-03 Cosmos x 3 NOTES ** Proton-M failure to reach orbit.

16 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

TABLE 8 Orbital Data for Araks-N/ARKON Satellites

PRE-MANOEUVRE ORBIT POST-MANOEUVRE ORBIT Orbital Orbital Orbital Perigee Apogee Angle of Orbital Orbital Orbital Perigee Apogee Angle of Epoch Inclina- Period (km) (km) Perigree Epoch Inclina- Period (km) (km) Perigree tion (°) (min) (°) tion (°) (min) (°) Cosmos 2344 1997 1997 1997-028B Proton-K third Jun 6.82 64.83 87.59 14 168 268 stage 1997-028C Proton-K Jun 7.00 64.54 112.61 201 2,492 258 fourth stage Jun 7.15 64.54 112.62 201 2,493 258 Jun 7.58 63.41 130.06 1,506 2,744 336 1997-028D Ullage motor Jun 7.00 64.54 112.39 182 2,491 258 1997-028E Ullage motor Jun 7.23 64.54 112.61 202 2,491 258 1997-028A Cosmos 2344 Initial orbit Jun 7.04 63.42 130.13 1,509 2,747 336 1997-028F Cosmos 2344 Jun 7.04 63.40 130.17 1,508 2,752 336 debris 1997-028G Cosmos 2344 Jun 23.11 63.41 129.80 1,514 2,714 336 debris Cosmos 2392 2002 2002 2002-037B Proton-K third Jul 25.87 64.86 87.53 145 159 226 stage 2002-037C Proton-K Jul 25.87 64.86 87.38 136 153 144 fourth stage case 2002-037D Proton-K Jul 25.87 63.47 119.86 1,510 1,839 0 fourth stage 2002-037E Ullage motor Jul 26.02 63.79 116.96 199 2,889 211 2002-037F Ullage motor Jul 26.43 63.79 116.90 193 2,889 211 2002-037A Cosmos 2392 Initial orbit Jul 25.79 63.47copy119.89 1,512 1,840 0 2002-037G Cosmos 2392 Jul 26.54 63.46 119.86 1,510 1,839 0 debris

Off-nominal mission of Proton-M was caused by exceeded According to investigators, Grishin, Nikolayev and Gudkova mass of the DM-03 upper stage due to designers’ error in cal- in 2011 were tasked with installing the angular rate sensors on culation of the volume in the prop filling manual the Proton rocket that are responsible for yaw control. of the upper stage (the system is developed by RSC-). “As a result of their violation of technical discipline envis- Therefore, the failure was clearly the result of human error dur- aged by engineering and technological documentation, these ing theSubscriber mission design phase. sensors were installed incorrectly at 180 degrees from their cor- rect position,” Markin said. The launch failure on July 2, 2013 was shown live on television, with the launch vehicle crashing within range of the camera. Legal Once more, the cause of the failure was “human error”, indicat- action was initiated against those who were deemed to be respon- ing a quality control problem with the launch vehicle. sible for the failure [20]: Although GLONASS missions are also flown using the Briz-M Employees of Russia’s Khrunichev State Space Research and fourth stage, as noted above there are clearly plans to continue us- Production Centre have been charged in connection with the ing the Blok DM-03 for some of the launches. 2013 crash of Proton carrier rocket with Glonass satellites, In- vestigative Committee’s official spokesman Vladimir Markin 5.3 Launches of the Araks-N satellites said on Wednesday. The original paper noted the launch of Cosmos 2344 in 1997 us- The Investigative Committee has completed the investiga- ing the Proton-K with a new upper stage designated Blok DM-5 tion into the criminal cases launched after a Proton-M rocket but the launch profile was not discussed in any detail. Here both carrying three Glonass navigation satellites crashed in July 2013 that launch and the launch of Cosmos 2392 - the second Araks-N seconds after liftoff, he said. satellite - will be discussed. The reconnaissance missions of the sat- ellites themselves have been discussed elsewhere [21]. Table 8 is a Three employees, Denis Grishin, Alexander Nikolayaev and modification of Table 16 in [21]. Diana Gudkova, have been charged with violating safety rules while carrying out works. The head of Russia’s Defence Min- Cosmos 2344 was launched without any advanced warning of istry’s 1653 military representation, Marat Nasibulin, has been an impending flight and it used the Proton-K with a new fourth charged with negligence. stage, designated Blok DM-5, which appears to be a derivative of

17 Phillip S. Clark the commercial Blok DM2 stage. Launch was to a low parking or- bit inclined at 64.8 degrees to the equator, and here the launch ve- hicle’s third stage as well as the fourth stage shroud were separated (although the shroud appears to have decayed from orbit before it was catalogued). The Blok DM-5 performed its first burn to raise apogee to nearly 2,500 km and slightly change the orbital inclina- tion. As the fourth stage and the attached satellite passed through apogee there was a second burn of the stage to place the assembly into a 1,500-2,750 km orbit with an inclination of 63.4 degrees: two ullage motors were catalogued in an orbit similar to the one of the Blok DM-5 after its first manoeuvre. The satellite was then separated from the fourth stage and two pieces of debris - assigned as “Cosmos 2344 debris” - subsequently appeared in orbit: these were probably camera covers or other such small attachments.

At the time of the Cosmos 2344 launch it was thought that the satellite would be a “one-off” mission, testing already-built hard- ware before it became “time expired”. It was therefore a surprise when a second Araks-N was launched in July 2002: this was named Cosmos 2392. The launch profile of the new satellite was similar

to that of Cosmos 2344, but the altitudes were somewhat different. CLARK PHILLP S.

For Cosmos 2392 the initial orbit was essentially the same as for Cosmos 2344. However, for Cosmos 2392 the two ullage mo- tors were in orbits reaching out to nearly 2,900 km, while the Blok DM-5 placed itself and the satellite into a 1,510-1,839 km orbit - a much lower apogee than seen on Cosmos 2344. And then Cosmos 2392 continued to operate in an orbit close to this.

The orbital altitudes are unique for the Russian reconnaissance satellite programme and they are not expected to be repeated since the Araks-N programme is now closed. Fig. 4 Two graphs showingcopy the relationship between the launch 5.4 Further comments about the domestic Blok DM time of the Proton-K/Blok DM type upper stage on missions launches intended to reach geosynchronous orbit. Figure 4(a) is an early representation of the relationship taken from [23] and This section will review some relationships which have been noted it reflects the launches which reached Earth orbit during the for the Proton-K launches of satellites to geosynchronous orbit. period 1980-1985. Each satellite is identified as K - / Cosmos, E - Ekran, G - Gorizont and R - Raduga. Figure 4(b) In 1981 (published in 1982) Nicholas L Johnson noted that there is an updated version of 4(a) and includes all of the launches was an almost linear relationship between the launch time of a ge- of the Proton-K/-M carrying a Blok DM variant intended to osynchronous mission and the day of the year that the launch took reach geosynchronous orbit and this includes failures to reach place [22]. Figure 4(a) reproduces a version of this relationship for orbit: commercial launches are excluded. It will be noted that satellitesSubscriber launched during 1980-1985 which Johnson published a few the “X-axis” showing launch dates differs for these two graphs. years later [23]. The rationale behind this relationship was to launch In Figure 4(b) only the satellites which do not fit the general the satellites into roughly the same orbital plane and “to minimise trend are identified: M-1S - Molniya-1S, E-AM - Ekspress-AM, lunar and solar perturbations and therefore conserve manoeuvring K - Kupon, Y - Yamal. fuel” [23]. It also meant that the satellites would have “passive” or- bital inclination control [24]: the initial inclination was normally ments to the west of 90 degrees E the drift orbit period is greater about 1.5 degrees, perturbations would reduce this to about 0.2 de- than 1,436 minutes. This is illustrated in Figure 5. This is not an grees over 18-24 months and then the inclination would start to in- exact relationship, it more of a trend than a one-to-one function. crease again and by the time that the inclination was degrading the In addition it should be noted that the trend breaks down com- communications coverage the satellite would be close to retirement pletely for satellites to be located to the west of about 20 degrees E. based upon the lifetime of the on-board instrumentation. 6 Proposed Use of a Modified Blok DM with the Figure 4(b) is this writer’s updated version of Figure 4(a), but Energiya Launch Vehicle with the date axis adjusted so that it is strictly date order, January to December. There are satellites which do not fit into the general This section has been prepared simply to give a more complete trend and these are identified by name on the graph. review of the history of the Blok DM family of upper stages. The Energiya launch vehicle was designed to place payloads into an It has previously been noted that there is an approximate rela- ascent orbit, and the payloads would require additional propul- tionship between the initial drift orbit of a satellite and the planned sion systems to reach a closed orbit - otherwise they will simply initial location [25] but this was not previously illustrated. Basi- re-enter the atmosphere within one circuit and be destroyed like cally, the standard launch profile would inject a satellite over ~90 the second stage central core. degrees E. For satellites to be located to the east of this location the drift orbit period would be less than 1,436 minutes: for deploy- The Russians therefore proposed two upper stages which could

18 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

TABLE 9 Data for the Retro-and-Correction Stage

Launch mass ~17 tonnes Maximum propellant load ~15 tonnes

PHILLP S. CLARK PHILLP S. Propellants liquid oxygen + hydrocarbon Main engine vacuum thrust 85 kN [= 8.7 tonnes] Length 5.5 metres Diameter 3.7 metres Number of ignitions 7 Spaceflight duration 1-2 years Notes These data are extracted from a table comprising part of Fig. 3 of the paper “The Space Vehicle for Today and Tomorrow” by Boris I Gubanov [26]. Fig. 5 This graph shows the general trend for satellites to be de- ployed to the east of 90 deg E to have lower drift orbit periods than those to be deployed to the west of this location. It should term which is normally applied to kerosene as used on the orig- be noted that satellites deployed to the west of 20 deg E do not inal Blok D and Blok DM stages. It is possible that the Russians fit the general trend. planned to use SYNTIN (also a hydrocarbon) as the fuel since it gives a better performance in terms of (an extra be attached to payloads to permit the attainment of operational 10 seconds or so) for the same mass. orbits: the retro-and-correction stage (R&CS), a modification of the Proton-K Blok DM fourth stage, was intended for low orbit When used on its own the RCS could place a payload of 88 operations and also to act as a spacecraft , while tonnes into a 200 km orbit or 81.5 tonnes into a 600 km orbit. the Energiya Upper Stage (EUS) was a liquid oxygen/liquid - The maximum payload dimensions for such a launch would be 5.5 drogen stage intended for launches to geosynchronous orbits and metres diameter and 35 metres long. deep space missions. These have been described in a publication by Boris Gubanov [26] and this writer reviewed the data elsewhere 6.2 Using Both Energiya Upper Stages Together [27]. The EUS will not be discussed in any detail here. The Russians proposed the use of both the EUS and the R&CS 6.1 The Retro-and-Correction Stage and Its Applications together for deep space missions, and for these the R&CS would act as the spacecraft service module: the maximum payload size Although the Russian literature did not say so, the R&CS was sim- would be 5.5 metres diametercopy and 19.5 metres long. ply a further variation of the Blok D/DM family of fourth stages which had flown on Proton-K missions. The basic data relating to In this configuration, the EUS could put the RCS and payload the stage are given in Table 9. into lunar orbit and the R&CS could soft-land about 10 tonnes on the lunar surface. Alternatively the assembly could be used to land The fuel for the RCS is described as being a “hydrocarbon”, a a similar mass on Mars while leaving a three tonnes spacecraft in Subscriber

Fig. 6 A series of Russian drawings from [26] showing the Blok DM variant identified as the Retro and Correction Stage (R&CS) and its planned application to the Energiya launch vehicle. Figure 6(a) shows a Russian diagram of the modified stage for use on Energi- ya: 6(b) shows the configuration when the R&CS is used as the “kick motor” for placing heavy payloads in low Earth orbit: 6(c) is the R&CS being used as a spacecraft service module for a deep space mission launched by Energiya with its proposed LOX/hydrogen upper stage: and 6(d) illustrates some of the missions being proposed for Energiya with its upper stages.

19 Phillip S. Clark orbit around the planet: or the assembly could be used to fly 5-6 programme will be reviewed here. tonnes on a mission to the planet Jupiter. When the Zenit launch vehicle was discussed for the first time 7 Use of the Blok DM-SL with the Zenit Launch by the Soviet Union, a planned three-stage version was described, even though at that time only the two-stage Zenit-2 had flown [28]. Vehicle At that time there were discussions to fly the proposed three-stage The original paper was presented in June 1999, although it was Zenit from a launch site that was being discussed for Cape York in not published until 2000 [1]. As a result the Sea Launch pro- Queensland, Australia. The launch vehicle, the Zenit-3 would add gramme was simply noted as an afterthought to the paper, the a Blok DM variant to a modified Zenit-2, and the resulting launch maiden launch having taken place in March 1999. Therefore the vehicle flying from an equatorial launch site could approximately TRANSLATION BY BART HENDRICKX BART BY TRANSLATION

copy Fig. 7 A Russian graphic showing from left to right the original Blok DM-SL, the variant for flight 16L (DirecTV 7S), the variant for flight 18L (Thuraya 2) and the variant for the Land Launch programme, Blok DM-SLB [29]. The four captions translate as: (1) DM-SL • new control unit using the Biser-3 computeradaptations to make it compatible with Zenit • introduction of an encapsulat- ed payload unit • adaptations to allow it to operate in a sea climate; (2) DM-SL #16 • increased specific impulse of the main engine by lengthening the nozzle • replacement of a tape-based memory unit by a static random-access memory unit in the On-Board Measurement System • design changes aimed at reducing mass; (3) DM-SL #18L • propellant mass increased by 1.5 t • removal of one low-gain antenna from the space radio communication • antenna system design changes aimed at reducing mass; (4) DM-SLB • replacement of the toroidal instrument compartment and frame in order to attach it to the instrument frame • removal of one set of Subscribertanks from the ullage motor system • removal of the space radio communication system and its antenna unit. BOEING LAUNCH SERVICES LAUNCH BOEING

Fig. 8 Left a photograph and right a cutaway of the basic Blok DM-SL used for the Sea Launch programme [30].

20 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017 equal the GTO capability of the Proton-K with a Blok DM fourth stage flying from the northerly .

The Zenit-3 launches from Cape York failed to materialise but after the demise of the Soviet Union, the Sea Launch company was set up for the commercial exploitation of a launch vehicle desig- nated Zenit-3SL. The partners for the programme were: BOEING LAUNCH SERVICES LAUNCH BOEING

• Boeing Commercial Space Company • RSC Energiya (supply of the Blok DM-SL third stage, Figures 7 and 8) • SDO Yuzhnoye (supply of the two Zenit stages) • Kvaerner Group (supply of the sea-based launch platform)

The Odyssey launch platform was located on the equator at 154 deg W, the equatorial launch site maximising the payload capabil- ity of the launch vehicle to GTO. Three different launch profiles were identified for Sea Launch missions to GTO and these are il- lustrated in Figure 9.

Table 10 provides a listing of all of the launches which used the Zenit-3SL: two variants of the Blok DM-SL third stage were Fig. 9 The three launch profiles planned for use within the Sea used, the second version having larger propellant tanks than the Launch programme [31].

TABLE 10 List of Zenit-3SL Launches, 1999-2014

Launch Date Stage 3 Stage 3 Launch Satellite Launch Date Stage 3 Stage 3 Launch Satellite Variant Burns Profile Variant Burns Profile 1999 Mar 28 1 2 PI DemoSAT 1999 Oct 10 1 2 PP1 DirecTV 1R 2000 Mar 12 1 2 Special* ICO 1 2000 Jul 28 1 2 PPI PAS 9 2000 Oct 21 1 2 PI Thuraya 1 copy 2001 Mar 18 1 2 PI XM 2 2001 May 8 1 2 PI XM 1 2002 Jun 15 2 2 PI Galaxy 3C 2003 Jun 10 2 2 PI? Thuraya 2 2003 Aug 8 1 2 PI EchoStar 9 2003 Oct 1 1 2 PPI Galaxy 13 2004 Jan 11 1 2 PI Telstar 14 2004 May 4 1 1 PI DirecTV 7S 2004 Jun 29 1 2 PI** 2005 Mar 1 2 2 PPI? XM 3 2005 Apr 26 2 1 PI Spaceway 1 2005 Jun 23 1 1 PI INTELSAT Americas 1 2005 Nov 8 2 2 PI INMARSAT-4 2 2006 FebSubscriber 15 1 2 PI EchoStar 10 2006 Apr 12 2 2 PI JCSAT 9 2006 Jun 18 2 2 PPI Galaxy 16 2006 Aug 22 2 2 PPI Mugungwha 5 2006 Oct 30 2 2 PPI? XM 4 2007 Jan 30 2 2 PI* NSS 8 2008 Jan 15 2 2 PI Thuraya 3 2008 Mar 19 2 2 PI DirecTV 11 2008 May 21 2 2 PPI Galaxy 18 2008 Jul 16 2 2 PI EchoStar 11 2008 Sep 24 2 2 PPI Galaxy 19 2009 Apr 20 2 2 PPI SICRAL 1B 2011 Sep 24 2 2 PPI? Atlantic Bird 7 2012 Jun 1 2 2 PI 2012 Aug 19 2 1 PI INTELSAT 21 2012 Dec 3 2 2 PI? EUTELSAT 70B 2013 Feb 1 2 1 PI* INTELSAT 27 2014 May 26 2 2 PI EUTELSAT 3B NOTES The launch profiles are identified as PI = perigee inject, PPI = post-perigee inject. It has not been possible to find a definitive listing that identified the launch profile used for each launch, which is why there are some question marks in the above listing; normally the profiles have been deduced from graphics released before the launches take place. All launches were intended to reach a geosynchronous transfer orbit with the exception of ICO 1, which is discussed in the main text. * Failed to reach orbit due to a malfunction of the Zenit launch vehicle. ** Under-burn of the Blok DM-SL third stage in orbit.

21 Phillip S. Clark

TABLE 11 List of Zenit-3SLB Launches, 2008-2013 Launch Stage 3 Satellite Launch Stage 3 Satellite Date Burns Date Burns

PHILLP S. CLARK PHILLP S. 2008 Apr 28 3 AMOS 3

2009 Feb 26 3 Telstar 11N 2009 Jun 21 3 MEASAT 3A

2009 Nov 30 3 INTELSAT 15

2011 Oct 5 3 INTELSAT 18

2013 Aug 31 3 AMOS 4

Fig.10 Graph showing the orbital evolution of the Telstar 18 satellite after it had separated from the Blok DM-SL stage As with the Proton-K commercial launches with the Blok DM which under-performed when manoeuvring to the geosyn- variants, the deployment orbit was chosen to minimise the propel- chronous transfer orbit where the satellite was planned to be lant that the satellite would need to manoeuvre from the deploy- deployed. Orbital data derived from the Two-Line Orbital ment orbit to the planned geosynchronous orbit. Elements. 8 Launch Record of Blok D and Blok DM Missions first version (see Figure 7). The overwhelming majority of launch- es were intended to reach GTO, but that of ICO 1 was intended for Table 12 is an updated version of Table 11 in [1] and it summarises a totally different orbit. the launch record for each launch vehicle variant to use a Blok D or DM upper stage. This Table counts the number of launches ICO 1 was planned to be the first launch in a new communica- which took place and also whether the Blok D variant was “live” tions satellite constellation to be operated by ICO Global Commu- or not. For example: nications. Two burns of the Blok DM-SL were planned (the Zenit stages would be sub-orbital), to enter the following orbits: In July 1968 a Proton-K/Blok D with a Zond/L-1 spacecraft was damaged on the way to the and burn 1 to 45 deg, 200(?) - 10,350 km was never flown: since no launch took place this vehicle is burn 2 to 45 deg, 10,350 km circular excluded from the launchcopy record. On this flight the first stage performed as planned, but a second In July 1971 the third N-1 was launched. This carried stage propulsion system “anomaly” meant that orbital injection mock-ups of lunar payloads and with a mock-up of the did not take place. Blok D: the Bloks A, B and V were “live” but it is not clear whether the Blok G trans-lunar stage was “live” or a mock- There were two other failures to reach orbit. NSS 8 was de- up. The Blok D was definitely not “live” and therefore this stroyed in a launch vehicle explosion shortly after launch. Another launch is excluded from the launch count. first stage failure resulted in INTELSAT 27 falling into the Pacific Ocean about 4 km from the launch platform. One also has to be careful about what is a failure of the Blok D series, although the following distinction is not made in Table 12. Telstar 18 was placed in a lower-than-planned orbit, with an On the lunar and planetary missions which used the Bloks D, D-1 apogee ofSubscriber 21,626 km instead of the planned 35,786 km due to the and D-2 atop the Proton-K vehicle, the fourth stage was controlled third stage shutting down early. The satellite was to use its by the payload: it was not until the Blok DM family was intro- on-board propellant to raise the orbit to the operational geosyn- duced that the fourth stage carried its own control unit. Therefore, chronous altitude where it operated successfully (see Figure 10). a failure by the payload on a deep space mission could result in the fourth stage not operating as it should have done. An off-shoot of the Sea Launch programme was the devel- opment of the Land Launch programme which would use only Table 12 shows that when it is given a chance to fire, the Blok slightly-modified variants of the Sea Launch Zenit-3SL: when used D, etc fourth stage is remarkably reliable, with a success rate in the for Land launch the launch vehicle became the Zenit-3SLB and the high 90% or even 100%. The original Proton-K with a Blok D is a third stage the Blok DM-SLB. Launches were from Baikonur using poor performer with an 82.1% success rate: however, it has to be the only land-based Zenit launch pad that was available. realised that most of these failures were in the “early days” of the launch vehicle’s operations and there were plenty of problems to Six launches took place (see Table 11), all of which were suc- be overcome with the launch vehicle. The Proton-K with the Blok cessful. The Baikonur launches away from the equator meant that D-2 only had three launches (the two Fobos spacecraft and Mars Land Launch was restricted to flying lighter satellites compared 8), and therefore the single failure of the Mars 8 mission (a space- with Sea Launch (and also the Proton launches). All of the launch- craft problem) brought the success rate down to two-thirds. es used three burns of the Blok DM-SLB: the first to enter orbit, then to GTO and finally to the deployment orbit. The following There were two failures in launches with the commercial Blok data for Telstar 11N are taken as an example. DM3 stage and these brought the success rate down to a “low” 92%. Similarly a single failure of the Zenit-3SL with the original burn 1 to parking orbit: 51.36 deg, 175-651 km Blok DM-SL third stage brought the success rate down to 93.3%. burn 2 to GTO: 50.73 deg, 202-35,575 km burn 3 to deployment orbit: 34.60 deg, 1,535-35,786 km All of the Blok D and Blok DM variants are now retired, with

22 Flights of the Blok DM Family Upper Stages 1999-2017

TABLE 12 Launch Record of the Blok D and Blok DM Upper Stages

Launch Vehicle Blok D First Launch Last Launch Launcher Blok Blok Total Blok Success Variant Failure Failure Success Launches Rate (%) Proton-K D 1967 Mar 10 1976 Aug 9 10 5 23 38 82.1 N-1 D 1969 Feb 21 1972 Nov 23 3 0 0 4 ---- Proton-K DM 1974 Mar 26 1990 Jun 20 5 1 60 66 98.4 Proton-K D-1 1975 Jun 8 1989 Dec 1 0 0 12 12 100.0 Proton-K DM-2 1982 Oct 12 2012 Mar 30 4 4 102 110 96.2 Proton-K D-2 1988 Jul 7 1996 Nov 16 0 1 2 3 66.7 Proton-K DM-2M 1994 Jan 20 2005 Mar 29 0 0 15 15 100.0 Proton-K DM3 1996 Apr 8 2006 Jun 17 0 2 23 25 92.0 Proton-K DM1 1996 Sep 6 1996 Sep 6 0 0 1 1 100.0 Proton-K DM4 1997 May 24 1997 May 24 0 0 1 1 100.0 Proton-K DM-5 1997 Jun 6 2002 Jul 25 0 0 2 2 100.0 Proton-K DM2 1997 Jun 18 1998 Apr 7 0 0 3 3 100.0 Zenit-3SL DM-SL 1 1999 Mar 28 2008 Jan 15 1 1 14 16 93.3 Zenit-3SL DM-SL 2 2003 Jun 10 2014 May 26 2 0 18 20 100.0 Proton-M DM-2 2007 Dec 25 2010 Sep 2 0 0 6 6 100.0 Zenit-3SLB DM-SLB 2008 Apr 28 2013 Aug 31 0 0 6 6 100.0 Proton-M DM-03 2010 Dec 5 2 0 1 3 100.0 Overall Blok D/DM totals 28 14 289 331 95.4 NOTES • Launch vehicle failures are split between the launch vehicle itself (three-stage Proton-K, the N-1 and the first two stages of the Zenit-SL) and theBlok D/DM variant upper stage. Although there were four flights of the N-1, a liveBlok D was not carried on the third launch, and therefore this is excluded from the count. The success rate is calculated as the percentage “(Blok success)/(Blok success + Blok failure)”, thus excluding the launches where the failures were due to lower stage malfunctions. • The Blok DM-03 is still in occasional use, as noted in the text: all of the other variants have been retired. copy the exception of the Blok DM-03. As noted in section 5.1 above, Acknowledgements there are still plans to launch the Blok DM-03 atop the Proton-M launch vehicle, although the Briz-M will be the fourth stage of The orbital analysis in this paper could not have been possible choice for the vehicle. Launches are also planned for some Anga- without the Two-Line Orbital Elements, generated by the United ra-5 missions. States Space Surveillance Network. The Two-Lines were originally distributed online via the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center’s Although plans are currently unclear, there are plans to revive Orbit Information Group, through to early 2005. Starting in Janu- the Sea Launch programme under the control of , and ary 2005 the Two-Lines have been issued via the Space-Track web it appears that a Blok DM-derived third stage will be used for that site, www.space-track.org. The staff at both the original OIG and programme. the current Space-Track websites are to be thanked for the contin- Subscriberued access to the files of Two-Line Orbital Elements. Therefore, the Proton-M/Blok DM variant might be retired by 2027, the 60th anniversary of the Blok D family, variants of the Thanks are due to Bart Hendrickx for translating the captions Blok DM might still be flying in ten years time. of some Russian illustrations.

References

1. Phillip S Clark, “Launch Profiles Used by the Four-Stage Proton-K”, Technical Report 14, page 18 (2000). JBIS, 53, pp 197-214, 2000. 7. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 1999, idem, page 26. 2. Phillip S Clark, “Flights of the Briz-M Upper Stage, 1999-2014”: 8. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2000, Molniya Space Consultancy to be presented in 2018 and subsequently published in JBIS/Space Technical Report 18, page 15 (2001). Chronicle. 9. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2002, Molniya Space Consultancy, 3. Posting by Stan Black (possibly a pseudonym) on the thread “Blok issue dated December 10 2002, page 3. D”, August 8, 2010: available online at http://forum.nasaspaceflight. 10. “Astra 1K Mission Overview”, data sheet published by International com/index.php?topic=22453.60 (accessed April 10, 2017). Launch Services, November 2002. 4. Phillip S Clark, “Launch Profiles Used by the Four-Stage Proton-K”, 11. “ILS investigation panel releases results of initial review”, ibid, pp 208-210. International Launch Services press release, January 29 2003. 5. Phillip S Clark, “Launch Profiles Used by the Four-Stage Proton-K”, 12. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2000, idem, page 29. ibid, p 206 13. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2000, idem, page 38. 6. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 1999, Molniya Space Consultancy

23 Phillip S. Clark

14. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2000, idem, pages 53-54. Geosynchronous Satellites”, JBIS, 35, pp 450-458, 1982. 15. Worldwide Satellite Launches, 2002, Molniya Space Consultancy 23. Nicholas L Johnson, Soviet Space Programs, 1980-1985, Univelt, pp issue dated November 10, 2002, pages 2-3. 70-71 (1987). 16. E-mail from International Launch Services to Phillip Clark, October 24. Phillip S Clark, “Launch Profiles Used by the Four-Stage Proton-K”, 2002. ibid, p 202. 17. Posting by “Danderman” (a pseudonym) on the thread “Blok D”, 25. Phillip S Clark, “Launch Profiles Used by the Four-Stage Proton-K”, March 23, 2013: available online at http://forum.nasaspaceflight. ibid, pp 201-202. com/index.php?topic=22453.60 (accessed April 10, 2017). 26. Boris I Gubanov, The Space Vehicle for Today and Tomorrow 18. Posting by “Baldusi” (a pseudonym) on the thread “Blok D”, August (Energiya), Soviet Technical Paper SSI BIG-2, issued by the Space 4, 2015: available online at http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index. Studies Institute, 1990. php?topic=22453.60 (accessed April 10, 2017). 27. Phillip S Clark, “Energia’s Next Stage” in Space Markets, issue 1, 19. Posting by “McDew” (a pseudonym) on the thread “Failure: 1990, pp 25-27. Proton-M launch with three GLONASS-M “, December 18, 28. Y A Smetanin, “Glavcosmos Operational Space Transportation 2010: available online at http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index. Systems”, paper presented at Progress in Space Transportation, the php?topic=22810.180 (accessed April 10, 2017). second European conference, May 1989. 20. “Criminal charges brought against Khrunichev employees for Proton 29. Posting by Stan Black (possibly a pseudonym) on the thread “Blok accident”, Parabolic Arc, May 27, 2015: available online at: http:// D”, January 22, 2011: available online at http://forum.nasaspaceflight. www.parabolicarc.com/2015/05/27/criminal-charges-brought- com/index.php?topic=22453.60 (accessed April 10, 2017). khrunichev-employees-proton-accident/ (accessed April 10, 2017). 30. Sea Launch User’s Guide, issued by Boeing Launch Services, January 21. Phillip S Clark, “Russia’s Photoreconnaissance Satellites, 1991-2016”, 2003, Figure 2-6 on page 2-8. section 9: submitted for publication in JBIS, publication awaited. 31. Sea Launch User’s Guide, idem, Figure 3-4 on page 3-8. 22. Nicholas L Johnson, “The Development and Deployment of Soviet copy Subscriber

24 Space Chronicle, Vol. 72, pp.25-27, 2019

SELECTING CHINA’S ASTRONAUTS

BERT VIS

When China was preparing for its manned space- – G-force tolerance (tested in a centrifuge) flight programme, they needed to find astronauts to fly the – Vestibular function (tested on the infamous rotating chair) spacecraft. And like both the Soviets and NASA had done be- – The candidate’s ears tolerance to changes in pressure fore them, they turned to the military to find suitable pilots.  – Altitude decompression susceptibility (tested in an altitude chamber) 1. The search begins  – Altitude hypoxia tolerance (also tested in the altitude cham- ber) The basic requirements for becoming an astronaut, or “hangtian – Head down tilt tolerance (tested on a tilting bed) yuan”, as the Chinese call them, were pretty simple: – Lower body negative pressure tolerance – Age between 25 and 35 – Blood redistribution adaptability  – Height between 1.62 m and 1.75 for male candidates and between 1.60 m and 1.75 m for female candidates After they had been turned inside out physically, the number – A bachelor degree or higher of potential astronauts had been brought down to 60. Those can-  – Be a PLAAF [Note: People’s Liberation Army Air Force] didates then underwent a psychological evaluation. pilot with a minimum of 800 hours flying time 3. Early selection The search for the first group was initiated in December 1995, with the screening of PLAAF pilots’ personnel files. Once that At some point, either shortly before or shortly after the selection had been completed, 886 pilots turned out to meet these basic process began, China hadcopy decided to send two men to Russia, to requirements. After further screening, 617 of them began the pre- undergo the basic cosmonaut training, or OKP, at the Gagarin liminary medical examinations. Cosmonaut Training Center (GCTC) in City. Purpose was to learn as much as possible about cosmonaut training and use 2. Medical selection that expertise for the Chinese manned space program. Therefore, the selection of two candidates was pulled forward and already These medical examinations would consist of three steps. First in late 1996 Li Qinglong and Wu Jie were chosen to undergo the was the clinical selection, followed by a general physiological OKP training course, beginning their training in November 1996. screening. The third step focused on the candidates’ tolerance for When it became known in the west that there actually were Chi- space environment conditions. nese pilots training in the GCTC, it was initially assumed that one of them would eventually fly on a Soyuz to the ISS. ForSubscriber the clinical selection the candidate’s medical history was studied, and a routine medical examination was carried out. Next, In the meantime, the selection process in China continued a ‘special’ examination was conducted. Unlike what had been with the 58 remaining candidates. During an interview the psy- done in the Soviet Union and the US, this meant that the candi- chologists determined their motivation, communication skills, date’s relatives, like his/her parents and children, were medically sense of humor, sense of risk, sense of competition, response screened. It is unclear, but also not very probable, that these peo- capability, management skills, etc. In addition, each candidate ple were informed why doctors they’d never seen before in their would undergo tests to determine his/her perception, memory, lives were interested in their state of health all of a sudden. How- thinking, attention and operating skills, hand-eye co-ordination, ever, in China you don’t ask questions and besides, the chance multi-tasking skills, etc. that you would get an answer is also small… Not only the prospective astronauts were interviewed. The se- Next, the candidates were given a more or less general medical, lection board went so far as to also interview the candidates’ com- with emphasis on cardiovascular function, pulmonary function manders and colleagues! They did this to evaluate the candidate’s and cerebral function. In each of these there were three levels in emotional stability, interpersonal compatibility, sense of humor, which the candidates could be classified. For a fourth test, on de- intelligence, capability to deal with dangerous situations, operating compression susceptibility, a candidate could only ‘pass’ or ‘fail’. skills, motivation to be successful, sense of competition, etc., etc.

Those who passed this screening were then tested in fields that Once this phase was completed, only 20 finalists were left and were specific for spaceflight medicine: each of them underwent what was described as a “comprehen- sive evaluation”. Six more pilots were dismissed, leaving 14 pilots, including the two that were in Russia. In May 1997 they were as- This paper was first presented at the British Interplanetary Society Sino- signed as the first astronaut group for the . The Russian Technical Forum in London on 21 June 2015. selection process had taken 16 month.

25 Bert Vis

Unlike NASA, but very much in line with the old Soviet Union, the names, biographies and portrait photos of the new astronauts were not published. The reason for this is unclear, especially when one looks at the detailed information that the Chinese have re- leased on spacecraft, spacesuits, etc., in the many books on their space programme. 4. A new selection

Given the number of the Chinese conduct (one each in 2003, 2005, and 2008) one may wonder why they had chosen no less than 14 astronauts. It is even more remarkable that in spite of this low flight rate, a second selection process was initiated in April/May 2009. Once more, all candidates came from the PLAAF.

Beginning in May, several hundred personnel files were Fig. 1 The first group of Chinese astronauts. From left: Li screened, and suitable candidates went through the preliminary Qinglong, , Chen Quan, Wu Jie, Pan Zhanchun, Nie clinical and psychological screenings. By August, the number had Haisheng, , Zhai Zhigang, , Zhao Chuan- been brought down to 45, who would go through the next phase. dong, , Zhang Xiaoguang, Deng Qingming and Jing Divided into three groups of 15, the candidates were subjected Haipeng. to more comprehensive medical screening, space environment tolerance and adaption inspection, and psychological evaluation. Around that time, by chance, British space enthusiast Neil Da The medical examinations were conducted in hospitals, while the Costa visited Star City and managed to meet the two Chinese, but space environment tolerance and adaption inspections, as well as language barriers prevented him from getting details about their the psychological evaluations took place at the Astronaut Center plans. However, he did succeed in getting them to pose for a few of China in Beijing. portrait photos. In November 2009 this second phase was concluded and 17 Li and Wu completed their training in Russia and returned to candidates (11 men and 6 women) were allowed to go through the China. With their experience from Russia they became the prin- third selection phase. This third phase would last from December cipal trainers for the others. The astronaut group was officially 2009 until February 2010. As had been done with the first group, sworn in on 5 January 1998 in Beijing Space City, and consisted of: the 17 candidates and their families were interviewed and medical- ly screened. After initially copydownsizing the group to ten (seven men CHEN Quan and three women), in February seven new astronauts were selected: DENG Qingming five men and two women. The group was sworn in on 5 May 2010. FEI Junlong Once again, no names and other biographical information was LI Qinglong released, but by using old-fashioned sleuthing techniques and LIU Boming much diligence, British researcher Tony Quine managed to un- LIU Wang earth the name of one of the women that had been selected: Wang Yaping. Later, the names of the others would also leak. The group PAN Zhanchun consisted of: WU Jie YANGSubscriber Liwei CAI Xuzhe ZHAI Zhigang ZHANG Xiaoguang ZHAO Chuandong WANG Japing YE Guangfu ZHANG Lu

In later years, some of the selection criteria for the women were revealed by the Chinese: they were supposed to be married and have had a child through natural child birth. In addition they were not allowed to have scars, foot calluses, and/or body odour. On top of that, they had to have perfect teeth. [NOTE: Time, 25 March 2010] It is unclear if the male candidates had to meet the same criteria (except, obviously, to have had a child), but they were remarkable to say the least.

In spite of the relatively large number of astronauts and the small number of flights, both women would fly on Shenzhou spacecraft to the small Tiangong-1 space station. Chen Dong would fly to Tiangong-2 on Shenzhou-11, while Ye Guangfu appears to have been assigned to the international cooperation Fig. 2 Swearing in of the first selection group, 5 January 1998. program with ESA. Not only was he involved in all the training

26 Selecting China’s Astronauts

The first two groups of Chinese astronauts

Cai Xuzhe Chen Dong Chen Quan

Fig. 3 Zhai Zhigang takes a ride in the rotating chair. Deng Qingming Fei Junlong Jing Haipeng sessions that ESA astronauts Samantha Cristoforetti and Matthi- as Maurer underwent in China, he also was a crewmember for ESA’s CAVES exercise in June 2016. Of the other three members of the second group, Cai, Tang and Zhang, even in 2018 nothing is known besides their names. 5. A third group Li Qinglong Liu Boming Liu Wang In 2013, it was hinted that a third group might be selected by Chi- na as early as 2014. However, in September of that year, Huang Weifen, the Deputy Chief Engineer of the ACC, said on Chinese television that “the third round of selection would be finished in the next two years”, so 2015 or 2016. She added that the group copy would include engineers from “space program research depart- ments”, and that they would have to have “more comprehensive professional skills and meet higher physical and psychological requirements”. No women would be included, as both Liu and Wang were still active. Liu Yang Nie Haisheng Pan Zhanchun

But 2015 and 2016 passed without anything happening. Then, in July 2017 it was reported that China’s first man in space, Yang Liwei, had announced that ten to twelve new astronauts would be selected “this year”, adding that the group would include two womenSubscriber [NOTE: Xinhuanet news report in English, 26 July 2017]. Given the time it takes to run a full selection process, Yang’s claim that the selection would take place in 2017 would have meant that the selection process was well underway already. Tang Hongbo Wang Japing Wu Jie

Nothing more was heard about new astronauts until January 2018, when a new announcement was made, as if there had never been a previous one [NOTE: Xinhuanet news report in English, 22 January 2018]. Again quoting Yang, in his role as Deputy Di- rector of the China Manned Space Engineering Office, it was re- ported that as many as 17 or 18 astronauts might be chosen. Yang had also given a few details on the selection criteria during an open day at the Astronaut Center of China. Three types of astro- Yang Liwei Ye Guangfu Zhai Zhigang nauts would be chosen: pilots, engineers and payload specialists. While the engineer-astronauts will be in charge of space station maintenance, the payload specialists will be the ones conducting the scientific experiments. It was also said that for the engineers a master’s degree was required. Those applying for payload special- ist should have a doctoral degree. In addition, applicants should have a minimum of three years’ work experience.

As of June 2018, no new group has been selected yet and there have been no indications when that might happen. Time will tell. Zhang Lu Zhang Xiaoguang Zhao Chuandong

27 Space Chronicle, Vol. 72, pp.28-35, 2019

THE PATH TO THE FIRST SPUTNIK: new insights

LYUBOV VERSHININA (translated and adapted by BART HENDRICKX)

It is widely accepted that the development of the world’s first Still, the obtained data left many scientific questions unan- satellite was initiated with decree nr. 149-88 of the USSR Coun- swered. Paradoxically enough, more was known at the time about cil of Ministers on 30 January 1956 (called “On The Develop- the physical properties of distant stars than about conditions at ment Of Object D”). This satellite was to conduct a broad range altitudes of several hundreds to thousands of kilometres above of scientific research in the interests of the Academy of Sciences. the Earth’s surface. To name but a few examples, little was known However, by the end of 1956 it became clear that the satellite about atmospheric density at high altitudes (about which there would not be ready any time soon and the idea was put forward was a lot of conflicting information), the structure of the iono- to quickly build a “very simple satellite” (“Object PS”) with a sphere, radio propagation properties of the atmosphere and the radio transmitter on board that could be launched before the danger posed by micrometeorites. beginning of the International Geophysical Year. That propos- al was approved by government decree nr. 171-93 issued on 15 The only way of answering these questions was to make long- February 1957. As a result, the satellite that had been slated to term observations of near-Earth space with artificial satellites. This fly first (“Object D”) ended up becoming the third Soviet satel- is why the idea of launching scientific instruments into Earth orbit lite. Using a mix of old and new source material (mainly archival gained ground in the early and moved from the realm of sci- documents), this article attempts to reconstruct the events that ence fiction to reality. Specialists from several organisations began led up to the passing of these key decrees. Among the findings working on concrete plans for launching satellites, so far without are that initial approval for the satellite project came as early as government support. August 1955 and that the idea of orbiting a satellite with only a radio transmitter on board originated even before that. 2. Early Studies of Satellitecopy Launch Vehicles 1. Introduction Early studies of satellite launch vehicles were a spin-off of research done on long-range ballistic missiles. The leading organization for By the early 1950s the sprawling Soviet rocket industry had ma- this research was the OKB-1 design bureau of , then tured enough to get down to the serial production of long-range still a part of the NII-88 scientific research institute. However, Ko- missiles. Although the first Soviet ballistic missiles, the R-1 and rolev also delegated some of that work to other organizations. R-2 (essentially modified versions of the German V-2), could hardly stand up to the potential enemy, they had given the Soviet An institute that did pioneering work in thе field of satellite Union a vast amount of engineering and organisational experience launch vehicles was NII-4, set up in 1946 to conduct fundamen- in the field and had also contributed to the development of both tal research on missile technology. The work was carried out by a the appliedSubscriber and fundamental sciences. team led by the institute’s Deputy Chief Mikhail Tikhonravov (Fig. 1), a veteran of the Rocket Scientific Research Institute (RNII) that A series of vertical rocket flights carrying scientific equipment had done groundbreaking research on missile technology in the had provided copious amounts of data in such areas as the struc- 1930s. In 1948 Tikhonravov’s team drew up a report summarizing ture and physical characteristics of the upper atmosphere, space its research on multistage . In early 1949 the department radiation and the reactions of animals to and high responsible for this research was abolished and only one former g-forces. For instance, in the period 1948-1957 a total of 18 R-1 member of the team, Igor Yatsunskiy, continued to work on this missiles were launched to altitudes of up to 100 km to study the particular theme. As Yatsunskiy later recalled: upper atmosphere. They collected data on: “In the middle of 1949 Tikhonravov showed particular interest in a graph that I had made on the basis of calculations – atmospheric pressure and temperatures up to altitudes of done not long before. It showed a curve depicting the relation 100, the chemical composition of the atmosphere, wind between the launch mass of a three-stage rocket and the mass speeds and directions at altitudes up to 80 km of a satellite. Tikhonravov proposed to apply these calculations – primary cosmic radiation to clusters consisting of rockets developed at the design bureau – the spectrum of solar radiation in the upper atmosphere of Sergei Korolev, which I did immediately” [2]. – friction with the atmosphere at supersonic speeds (infor- mation badly needed by the aviation industry) Around July-August 1949 Korolev first saw these graphs and immediately realised their importance. Spurred by Korolev’s en- The flights also demonstrated the potential of using the instru- thusiasm, Tikhonravov presented a paper at a scientific conference ments to measure electron concentrations in the and of NII-4 in March 1950 called “Rocket clusters and prospects for at altitudes up to 500-600 km. In addition, they showed that living their future use”. This is the first time that he publicly discussed organisms (dogs in particular) could survive rocket flights and be the possibility of launching into space artificial satellites and even safely recovered from altitudes of about 90 km [1]. people in the foreseeable future [3].

28 The Path to the First Sputnik: new insights

tect a spacecraft from the temperatures it was expected to experi- ence during re-entry. After consulting with Vladimir Yazdovskiy, a specialist of the Institute of Aviation and (GNII- IAiKM), Eneyev also came to the conclusion that the high g-forces would not present an insurmountable problem for people return- ing from orbit. Although Eneyev never published the results of his work, he discussed them with Tikhonravov and his team, who had initially also been skeptical about the possibility of returning people from space. However, Eneyev’s research aroused so much interest that Tikhonravov’s team repeated his calculations and sent a corresponding report to OPM MIAN. Although Eneyev does not say when exactly he made these studies, they were presumably part of a broader satellite research effort started at OPM MIAN in 1953 on Korolev’s orders [6]. 3. Efforts to sell the satellite idea

After Tikhonravov’s conversation with Korolev in 1953, he got at least some support for the idea of launching Earth satellites at the ministerial and military level, more particularly from Georgiy Pashkov (who headed a secret department in the Ministry of Me-

RUSSIAN STATE ARCHIVE OF SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL DOCUMENTATION (RGANTD) DOCUMENTATION AND TECHNICAL OF SCIENTIFIC ARCHIVE STATE RUSSIAN dium Machine Building overseeing missile development) and An- drei Sokolov (the Deputy Commander of the Artillery for Reactive Weapons) [7].

Preliminary calculations performed by Tikhonravov’s team by the end of the year made it possible for Korolev to go one step further. In a draft version of the technical specifications for the R-7 intercontinental ballistic missile released on 10 December 1953, Fig. 1 Soviet satellite pioneer Mikhail Tikhonravov. one of the future tasks mentioned for the rocket was the launch of satellites. On 22 December 1953 Korolev met with the Minister of the Defence Industry Dmitriy Ustinov (Fig. 2) and proposed him Thanks to Korolev’s support, Tikhonravov had already received to set up a department withincopy OKB-1 to design artificial Earth sat- permission shortly before the presentation to continue studies of ellites and other space vehicles and to transfer Tikhonravov’s team clustered rockets and for that purpose set up a team of young en- from NII-4 to OKB-1 [8]. gineers consisting among others of Gleb Maksimov, Lidiya Solda- tova, Anatoliy Brykov and Yan Koltunov. In 1950 the team studied Apparently, Korolev’s proposals made at least some impression the orbital dynamics of an artificial Earth satellite, focusing on aspects such as orbital manoeuvring and de-orbiting of satellites. Also studied was a two-stage clustered satellite launch vehicle con- sisting of three of OKB-1’s R-3 intermediate range missiles. This was the first Soviet proposal for a satellite launch vehicle based on existingSubscriber designs for single-stage rockets [4]. Several years later, as the intercontinental ballistic missile that would eventually be named R-7 was already taking shape on the drawing boards, Korolev apparently thought the time was ripe to start working on satellites in earnest. As Tikhonravov recounts in his memoirs, he had a conversation with Korolev in 1953 during which the latter asked him to do just that, saying his own peo- ple at OKB-1 were too pre-occupied with other work [5]. Korolev may have given similar orders to a team at the Division of Applied Mathematics of the V.A. Steklov Mathematical Institute (OPM MIAN). Like their colleagues at NII-4, this team, headed by Dmi- triy Okhotsimskiy, had earlier done research on clustered launch vehicles and studied the launch of artificial Earth satellites as one of the possible applications of such rockets.

One of the team members, Timur Eneyev, says that he even made calculations related to the ballistic return of a piloted space- (RGANTD) DOCUMENTATION AND TECHNICAL OF SCIENTIFIC ARCHIVE STATE RUSSIAN craft from Earth orbit. As recounted by Eneyev in his memoirs, OPM MIAN director (the later President of the USSR Academy of Science) was skeptical of his work, claiming it would be very dangerous for a person to return to Earth because of the high temperatures and g-loads. Nevertheless, Eneyev tried to prove that existing heat-resistant materials could be used to pro- Fig. 2 Minister of the Defence Industry Dmitriy Ustinov.

29 Lyubov Vershinina/Bart Hendrickx on Ustinov. On 7 February 1954, 1.5 months after his meeting This document, which was ready by 5 August 1955, was signed with Ustinov, Korolev telephoned Tikhonravov with the request not only by Korolev himself, but also by Mikhail Khrunichev (the to prepare a memo on artificial satellites for Ustinov. Just over a deputy chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers) and Vasiliy month later, on 16 March, Korolev and Tikhonravov both attend- Ryabikov (the Chairman of the Special Committee, established by ed a meeting on artificial Earth satellites organised by OPM MIAN Soviet leader in April 1955 to run the long- director Mstislav Keldysh [9]. The memo prepared by Tikhonra- range missile programme). It stated that preliminary research by vov was ready by 30 March and on 24 April Keldysh discussed it scientists and designers had shown that it was technically feasible with the President of the Soviet Academy of Sciences Aleksandr to build a “very simple Earth satellite” with a mass of 1.5 to 2 tons Nesmeyanov [10]. and launch it with the R-7 rocket. The overall launch mass of the fueled rocket with the artificial satellite would be about 270 tons. On 25 May 1954 representatives of NII-4 (Igor Yatsunskiy, Gleb The satellite would orbit the Earth in 1 hour and 40 minutes and its Maksimov and Igor Bazhinov) and OPM MIAN (Dmitriy Okhot- altitude above the Earth’s surface would be between 200 and 700 simskiy and Timur Eneyev) met to make adjustments to the memo km”. This was one of the first known documents to propose the (called “On An Artificial Earth Satellite”), after which it was -ap launch of a satellite using the R-7 rocket [16]. proved the same day at a session of the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences attended by Korolev and Tikhonravov. The following The fact that the document was signed by high-ranking figures day Korolev sent the memo to Dmitriy Ustinov. In the accompa- such as Khrunichev and Ryabikov indicates that all the ministries nying letter, Korolev pointed out the need to set up “a scientific re- and organisations involved in the satellite project had approved search department to conduct the first preliminary studies of a sat- the proposed work on an artificial Earth satellite. What may have ellite and to work out a number of related issues in greater detail”. contributed to this high-level support was an announcement by Also enclosed were translated articles on work done in this field the White House on 29 July 1955 that the United States would by the United States [11]. However, while Ustinov may have been launch small artificial Earth satellites as part of the IGY. Speaking personally interested in Korolev’s satellite proposals, there was lit- at a press conference during the Sixth International Aeronautical tle he could do to put them into practice. His main responsibility Congress in Copenhagen on 2 August 1955, Soviet Academician was to ensure the timely delivery of weapons (not only missiles) Leonid Sedov had responded to the White House announcement to the country’s armed forces and he could not single-handedly by saying that the realization of a Soviet satellite project could be decide to set up a satellite department at Korolev’s design bureau, expected “in the near future”. This was the first public announce- the more so because the idea of launching satellites into space was ment of the Soviet Union’s intention to launch satellites. still considered to border on science fiction. 4. Formal Approval of the Satellite Project Meanwhile, on 9 July 1954 the Soviet Union decided to take part in the International Geophysical Year (IGY), which was to The only step remaining was to get the go-ahead from the high- last from 1 July 1957 until 31 December 1958, and to establish an est echelons of power, namelycopy the head of the Central Committee Interdepartmental Committee under the Presidium of the Soviet of the Communist Party Nikita Khrushchev and the Chairman Academy of Sciences which would prepare and conduct Soviet ex- of the USSR Council of Ministers Nikolai Bulganin. On 8 August periments in the framework of the IGY. This was the Soviet arm of 1955 the Presidium of the Central Committee adopted a decree the Special Committee for the IGY (known by its French acronym that sanctioned the development of a satellite [17]. It marked the CSAGI), the international governing body for all IGY activities. official start of the satellite project and called for preparing a series On 4 October 1954 CSAGI included the launch of artificial Earth of broad proposals to turn this idea into reality. These would then satellites in the programme for the IGY. have to pay the way to a more concrete decree of the Council of Ministers which would specify such things as the satellite’s design, Behind the scenes, Korolev and Tikhonravov continued their the manufacturers of the various parts and the timelines for its efforts to garner political support for a satellite program. On 18 development. Khrunichev and Ryabikov were given one and a half January Subscriber1955 Tikhonravov sent another memo to Georgiy Pash- months to present a plan of action to the Central Committee. kov which summed up the work that needed to be carried out to develop what he called “an automated Earth satellite” [12]. The On the same day that the Presidium signed the decree, Tikhon- contents of the memo had earlier been agreed upon with Korolev. ravov (who was most likely unaware of the decree’s existence due On 4 May Tikhonravov sent yet another memo (co-authored by to secrecy) sent a document to Pashkov and Korolev called “Main Dmitriy Okhotsimskiy of OPM MIAN and Igor Yatsunskiy of information about the scientific significance of a very simple sat- NII-4) to Keldysh, Korolev, Pashkov and Deputy Minister of the ellite and on expected expenditures” [18]. On 27 August Korolev Defence Industry Konstantin Rudnev. This also included a draft and Tikhonravov in turn sent a letter to Pashkov, decree of the USSR Council of Ministers on the development of an (head of the OKB-456 engine design bureau) and Mikhail Ryazan- Earth satellite [13]. At Korolev’s request, Tikhonravov and OKB- skiy (director of NII-885, which specialized in guidance systems). 1’s Ilya Lavrov prepared a third memo on 16 June with proposals Enclosed were three sets of documents: 1. Preliminary data on Ob- to organise work on satellites. As Tikhonravov recalls in his mem- ject D (the name given to the first satellite) ; 2. Draft decree of the oirs, this memo “along with all materials were … handed over to Council of Ministers ; 3. Theoretical and experimental research on Korolev, who sent them to the archive on 3 September. It took him the creation of an artificial Earth satellite [19]. two and a half months to think them over” [14]. After a meeting in Ryabikov’s office on 30 August, a letter was With hindsight, this claim turns out to be false, which can prob- sent to the Presidium of the Central Committee on 3 September ably be attributed to the lack of archival materials that Tikhonra- about the organisational and technical aspects of developing an vov had access to when writing his recollections [15]. In actual artificial Earth satellite. This included the following proposals: fact, the 16 June 1955 memo received by Korolev seems to have – to design an artificial Earth satellite on the basis of the R-7 formed the very basis for a document that Korolev himself sent to rocket … and conduct the first experimental launch in the the higher authorities and which in turn led to the approval of the first half of 1957; satellite project in the summer of 1955. – to entrust to the USSR Academy of Sciences overall scientific

30 The Path to the First Sputnik: new insights

leadership over the satellite [project] and also the develop- TABLE 1 “Very simple satellites” proposed in May 1955* ment of scientific equipment for it; Stages [Launch vehicle] Objectives – to entrust the USSR Academy of Sciences, the Ministry of the Defence Industry, the Ministry of the Radiotechnical 1. Very simple satellite 1. Testing means for the radio Industry and the Special Committee with the task of pre- having radio com- location of Article R*. Studies munication with the of the Earth’s gravitational senting a list of scientific assignments to be completed by the Earth, non-orientable. field. satellite and also of the scientific equipment needed for this. 2. Very simple Replacement in 2. Scientific observations: Enclosed were preliminary details on a “very simple satellite” automated satellite, Article R of the photo reconnaissance, orientable in space warhead and mapping, weather forecasts, with a mass of 1.1 tons and a schedule to complete the work on and having radio changes in the experiments to resolve a the satellite [20]. communication with launch profile. series of problems related the Earth. to the development of more It can be concluded from what has been described here so far complex satellites. that in the period 1953-1955 the concept of developing an artifi- * Literally translated excerpt from a letter written by Tikhonravov and others. cial Earth satellite underwent a rapid evolution, going from pre- ** R-7 ICBM liminary calculations by a handful of individuals to its widespread discussion by the industry, the Academy of Sciences, military spe- cialists and government organisations and eventually to its formal Elaborating on the first type, the authors wrote: “In order to approval by the Central Committee of the Communist Party. reduce the development time of the very simple satellite, the first one … can be a construction consisting of a … second stage of 5. Early Plans For a “Very Simple Satellite” Article R having on board only a transponder. Such a variant of the satellite will make it possible to determine its motion with the help In late 1955 Korolev took the initiative to start design work on of radio measurements”. Transponders, on-board devices that pro- the satellite in a department of OKB-1 led by Sergei Kryukov. He duce a response when receiving a radio frequency interrogation, also sent another request to Deputy Defence Minister Mitrofan had been used in Soviet aviation since 1943 and therefore were a Nedelin to have Tikhonravov’s team transferred from NII-4 to logical payload for the “very simple satellite”. Although the idea at OKB-1. This time the response was positive. The first members the time was to fly the transponder on the orbiting second stage of of Tikhonravov’s team to join OKB-1 were Lidiya Soldatova and the R-7 rather than on a deployable satellite, the basic idea behind Gleb Maksimov. In late 1955 they were transferred to a section in what eventually became the first artificial Earth satellite in Octo- Kryukov’s department headed by Yevgeniy Ryazanov, where they ber 1957 (namely an orbiting “radio station”) had already been formulated preliminary proposals for a scientific satellite weighing proposed in May 1955. As can be seen in the table, the second 1.1 tons, while at the same time recommending to build a simpler type of very simple satellite could be used for a variety of purposes satellite first [21]. A preliminary design for the 1.1 ton satellite was depending on the equipmentcopy it carried. ready by July 1956. Tikhonravov himself moved to OKB-1 on 1 November 1956. In the earlier mentioned letter sent to the Presidium of the Cen- tral Committee of the Soviet Communist Party on 3 September The idea that the launch of the scientific laboratory should be 1955, the main focus was on the second type of satellite, namely preceded by that of a simpler satellite was not new. The earliest the one that was to serve as a scientific laboratory and was called known document where reference is made to such a satellite is “Object D” (Fig.3 overleaf) by early 1956 (and which at the time a letter written on 4 May 1955 by Tikhonravov, Yatsunskiy, Ok- was also defined as a “very simple satellite”). The bulk of the work hotsimskiy and an unidentified fourth person. It included a “Pro- would have to be shouldered by the Academy of Sciences. The fol- gramme of work to create artificial satellites”, which envisaged the lowing division of labour was proposed: development of a wide array of satellites differing in purpose and – the Academy of Sciences would be in overall leadership of complexitySubscriber and ranging from “very simple satellites” to piloted the satellite program and the development of all scientific space stations [22]. equipment – the industry’s ministries would be in charge of building the It should be pointed out that the term “very simple satellite” satellite as “a special carrier of scientific equipment” (prosteishiy sputnik) at the time was applied to virtually any space – the Academy of Sciences, the Ministry of the Defence In- vehicle that did not have people on board. In a letter written on 25 dustry, the Ministry of the Radiotechnical Industry and the May 1954, Tikhonravov had defined it very broadly as “an appa- Special Committee would draw up a list of scientific tasks ratus without people, moving along an elliptical orbit and intend- that needed to be carried out by the satellite and also formu- ed for scientific goals” [23]. In the 4 May 1955 document a more late proposals on the scientific equipment to be carried [24]. specific definition was given: “It is possible to make the satellite orientable in space and to communicate with the satellite via ra- In his memoirs, Tikhonrarov refers to a series of meetings in dio. We will call such a satellite a very simple automated [satellite]. the office of Mstislav Keldysh held between December 1955 and It can be used for a wide range of scientific observations…, and March 1956, each of which discussed specific scientific goals for also for reconnaissance, photography, making maps of the terri- the satellite: studies of cosmic rays, the ionosphere, the Earth’s tory of the adversary and forecasting the weather in any area on etc. The meetings were usually led by Keldysh, with Earth”. In other words, a “very simple satellite” was understood to Gennadiy Skuridin (a space scientist of OPM MIAN) acting as the be an unpiloted automated vehicle intended for scientific studies secretary. All the meetings focused on the scientific data that the or military applications and being in radio contact with the Earth. satellite could gather in these various fields, which instruments it It could be either orientable or lack orientation systems. should carry and who should build them.

The authors of the 4 May 1955 document mentioned two types Despite the focus on the scientific laboratory, the 3 September of “very simple satellites” with which the work should begin, 1955 letter envisaged “simultaneous work on a small Earth satellite namely a non-orientable and an orientable satellite (Table 1). which can be used for demonstration purposes and for systematic

31 Lyubov Vershinina/Bart Hendrickx RGANTD

Fig. 3 “Object D”, eventually launched as Sputnik-3 on 15 May 1958. research of scientific problems”. In the attached draft decree of the now being designated Object MPS (probably meaning malyy pros- Council of Ministers, this goal was literally formulated as follows: teishiy sputnik or “small very simple satellite”).

“…to study the possibility of developing in the period The fact that a smaller precursor satellite was already being 1956-1958 a small-size artificial Earth satellite (Object MSP) considered at this stage is also confirmed in the memoirs of Tik- as a third stage on the basis of the R-5 and R-11 [missiles] for honravov. Referring to a letter written by Konstantin Bushuyev on systematic scientific studies and to present corresponding pro- 30 January 1956, he writes: “Design work [on the satellite] had of posals to the USSR Council of Ministers within a month” [25]. course begun in S.S. Kryukov’s department before the release of the decree. The general idea was to build an artificial satellite with In other words, the idea of building a very simple precursor sat- a mass of 1.1 tons and first launch a very simple satellite” [27]. By ellite, while not prominent, had certainly not been ruled out. One that he apparently meant an orbiting radio station. can speculate that there were two main reasons for proposing both the precursor satellite and the more complex scientific laboratory. While the idea of launching the simpler satellite with another rocket than the basic R-7 wascopy no longer included in the January First, the organisation that placed orders for rocket technology 1956 decree, OKB-1 did perform studies of such alternative launch at the time was the Ministry of Defence, which was not convinced vehicles in the ensuing months. By August 1957 the design bu- of the need to perform space missions and often saw them as a reau finished a report called “Studies of the main characteristics waste of money. Therefore, it would take a consolidated joint ef- of rockets for the launch of a small artificial Earth satellite” [28]. It fort by the industry and the Academy of Sciences to persuade summed up possible designs for launch vehicles capable of launch- the military to fund the satellite project. Sending a simple radio ing small satellites with masses ranging from 40 to 50 kg and 200 transponder into space would hardly be enough to convince the to 300 kg. They would be based on the 8K51 (R-5M), 8A61 (R-11) military, which is why the proposals presented to the government and 8K71 (R-7) missiles. Four configurations were studied: placed emphasis on a wide range of scientific and practical experi- “Version 1: a three-stage rocket on the basis of the 8K51 and ments, some of which could serve military interests. 8A61 [missiles] with a special third stage; SubscriberVersion 2: a three-stage rocket on the basis of the 8K51 Second, the development of a scientific laboratory would take a [missile] with a special second and third stage; long time, require considerable investments and the involvement Version 3: a two-stage rocket on the basis of the central engine of numerous organisations and design bureaus. A satellite carrying unit of the 8K71 [missile] with a special second stage; only a radio transponder, on the other hand, could be built in a Version 4: a three-stage rocket on the basis of the central relatively short period of time by a small number of organisations engine unit of the 8K71 [missile] with a special second and and was therefore considered an ace in the hole. third stage”.

On 30 January 1956 the USSR Council of Minister adopted the The report concluded: final version of the decree (nr. 149-88ss), which was called “On the “1. The three-stage versions on the basis of the 8K51 Development of Object D” [26]. It called for the launch in 1957 of can place into orbit only very small satellites and are a satellite with a mass of between 1 and 1.4 tons and 200 to 300 kg therefore not of significant interest. The version with of scientific equipment. However, just like the draft decree drawn a second stage on the basis of the 8A61 is not even up in September 1955, the final version of the decree left open the capable of launching a satellite with the smallest weight. option of launching a “small-size artificial Earth satellite” in the 1956-1958 timeframe (this time without mentioning a launch ve- 3. The rockets … that deserve most attention are: hicle based on the R-5 and R-11). The names used for both types a) a two-stage rocket on the basis of the central engine of satellites had now changed. In the draft decree the 1 ton scien- unit of the 8K71 (missile) with a specially developed tific satellite had been called Object SP (presumably standing for second stage using liquid oxygen; sputnik or “satellite”) and the simpler satellite Object MSP (pre- b) a three-stage rocket on the basis of the central engine sumably standing for malyy sputnik or “small satellite”). However, unit of the 8K71 (missile)- with a specially developed in the final version of the decree the scientific laboratory was for second stage using liquid oxygen and a third stage using the first time officially named Object D, with the simpler satellite a high-boiling oxidizer such as nitric acid”.

32 The Path to the First Sputnik: new insights RGANTD

Fig. 4 The first Sputnik and its internal components.

Having been completed in the summer of 1957, these studies fications for the simple satellite. In his memoirs, Tikhonravov were clearly not related to the first satellite, but were probably summed up the specifications for what was now called “Object PS” geared to developing smaller launch vehicles for future small sat- (Figs 4 and 5). In summary, these were: ellites that did not require the power of the R-7. That work was eventually transferred to the OKB-586 design bureau of Mikhail 1. The satellite should be as simple and reliable as possible Yangel, which built small launch vehicles based on its R-12 and and at the same time incorporate some of the features of R-14 intermediate range ballistic missiles. the Object-D (such as the use of a pressurized container and a thermal control system). 6. The “Very Simple Satellite” Moves to the Foreground 2. The satellite should have a spherical shape, making it possible to measure the density of the upper layers of the atmosphere as accurately as possible by following its On 14 September 1956 Mstislav Keldysh, who headed a Special orbital decay. Commission under the Academy of Sciences to oversee the de- copy velopment of Object D, presented an update on the work during a meeting of the Academy’s Presidium. As it turned out, work on the Object D was running far behind schedule, as a result of which the Presidium adopted a resolution on taking several measures to RGANTD rectify the situation [29]. The delays were not only due to organ- isational problems, but also to the fact that the industry did not have the needed capacity to timely deliver parts for the various scientific instruments.

It was exactly around this time that Korolev decided to play his trumpSubscriber card and raised the issue of developing the “orbiting radio station”. On 5 January 1957 he sent a draft proposal on such a sat- ellite to the chairman of the Special Committee of the USSR Coun- cil of Ministers and the Minister of the Defence Industry Dmitriy Ustinov. This proposal was to be forwarded to the Central Com- mittee and envisaged the launch of two rockets which with some minor modifications could be used to launch satellites carrying a payload of about 25 kg. Korolev wrote that despite many diffi- culties, test flights of the R-7 ICBM could begin in March 1957, paving the way for the satellite launches in the April-June 1957 timeframe.

The idea was to place the 7,700 kg core stage of the rocket into an orbit somewhere between 225 and 500 km above the Earth and release from it a spherical container with a diameter of about 450 mm and a mass of 40-50 kg. Among the instruments would be a shortwave transmitter with a power supply for 7 to 10 days [30]. In this way, Korolev had returned to the old idea of the “orbiting radio station”, the only difference with the earlier proposal being that it would be installed on a satellite rather than on the core stage of the R-7 and would use a transmitter rather than a transponder.

On 25 January 1957 Korolev approved the technical speci- Fig. 5 Cut-away drawing of the first Sputnik

33 Lyubov Vershinina/Bart Hendrickx

3. The satellite should be equipped with a permanently operating radio transmitter working on at least two frequencies and having a power output of about 1 Watt. This ensures that its signals can be received at great distances not only by specialized stations, but also by radio amateurs.

4. The antennas should have a radiation pattern that is as close as possible to circular so that the rotation of the satellite does not affect the strength of the signals. The core stage of the rocket has to be equipped with angular reflectors to test the possibility of determining its orbit through the reflection of signals.

5. The on-board equipment should be powered by an electrochemical power source that keeps it functional for at least two to three weeks. (RGANI) HISTORY OF CONTEMPORARY ARCHIVE STATE RUSSIAN

6. The pressure and temperature inside the satellite should be measured by sensors which must change the form of the radio signals if the pressure drops or temperatures exceed acceptable limits.

7. The satellite should be mounted on the rocket in such a way that it can separate from the core stage without problems and unfurl its antennas [31].

In this way, the basic design of what would go into history as the world’s first artificial Earth satellite had been determined by early 1957 (although the final mass of the satellite would be 83.6 kg rather than 40-50 kg). The new plan was officially sanctioned by a decree of the Presidium of the Central Committee on 15 Feb- ruary 1957 (Fig.6), which paved the way for the launch of the first copy Sputnik on 4 October 1957. Object D, once intended to become the first Soviet satellite, was eventually launched on 15 May 1958 Fig. 6 The cover letter of the 15 February 1957 decree that approved the as the third Soviet satellite. launch of the first Sputnik.

References

1. B. Raushenbakh (ed.), S.P. Korolev i ego delo. Svet i teni v istorii OKB-456 design bureau) and scientists Pyotr Kapitsa, kosmonavtiki. Nauka, Moscow, p. 216-217, 1998. Ilya Kibel, Sergei Vernov and Semyon Khaikin. 2. I.M. Yatsunskiy, “On M.K. Tikhonravov’s work in the period 1947- 10. Yu. Biryukov (ed.), Materialy po istorii kosmicheskogo korablya 1953Subscriber on the possibility of creating multistage rockets” (in Russian), Vostok. Nauka, Moscow, p. 209, 1991. published in : Iz istorii aviatsii i kosmonavtiki, nr. 42, p. 35, 1980. 11. M. Keldysh (ed.), Tvorcheskoye naslediye akademika Sergeya 3. Ibid Pavlovicha Koroleva. Izbrannye trudy i dokumenty. Nauka, Moscow, 4. Ibid p. 343, 1980. 5. Tikhonravov wrote his memoirs in 1972 (two years before his death) 12. B. Raushenbakh, op. cit., p. 661. and handed them over to Georgiy Vetrov, a historian of the Korolev 13. Ibid, p. 662. design bureau. They later ended up in the Central State Archive of 14. M. Tikhonravov, op. cit. p. 92. the City of Moscow (GBU TsGA). A much truncated and edited 15. Tikhonravov’s memoirs contain seventeen pages on the history of version was published in: A. Ishlinskiy (ed.), Akademik S.P. Korolev. the first Sputnik, but he mentions only three of the memos that were Uchenyy. Inzhener. Chelovek., Nauka, Moscow, pp. 445-448, 1986. written on the subject with his participation, while there were at least The author published the full version in 2017 under the title: M. eight. While the memoirs seem to be largely based on documents Tikhonravov, “Notes on the history of the creation of the world’s first from the archives of the Korolev design bureau, it would seem artificial Earth satellite” (in Russian), Geopolitika i bezopasnost’ , nr. Tikhonravov did not have access to all of them. He does not mention 4, pp. 91-100, 2017. the 8 August 1955 decree of the Central Committee, indicating he 6. Eneyev’s memoirs (written in 1992) are in the archives of the M.V. probably had not been told about it at the time because of secrecy. Keldysh museum. 16. Document from the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History 7. M. Tikhonravov, op. cit., pp. 91-92. (RGANI). 8. Document from the Central State Archive of the City of Moscow. 17. Document from the Archives of the President of the Russian 9. The other persons who attended the meeting were Vasiliy Mishin Federation (AP RF). For more on the events leading up this decree, and Konstantin Bushuyev of OKB-1, Valentin Glushko (head of the see: A. Siddiqi, “The Sputnik Decision Revisited”, Quest: The History

34 Space Chronicle, Vol. 72, pp.35-36, 2019

of Spaceflight Quarterly, Vol. 14, nr. 4, pp. 20-28, 2007. 22. Document from the archives of RKK Energiya. 18. B. Raushenbakh, op. cit., p. 662. 23. Document from the M.V. Keldysh museum. 19. Document from the Central State Archive of the City of Moscow. 24. Document from the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History 20. Document from the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History. (RGANI) (see Reference 15). The letter was signed by Mikhail Khrunichev, Vasiliy Ryabikov, 25. Document from the Russian State Archive of Contemporary Dmitriy Ustinov, Valeriy Kalmykov (Minister of the Radiotechnical History; S. Kudryashov, (ed.), Sovetskiy kosmos. Arkhiv Prezidenta Industry), (Deputy Minister of Defence) , Rossiyskoi Federatsii, Moscow, pp. 28-30, 2011. Nikolai Pilyugin (chief designer at NII-885), Valentin Glushko and 26. The full text of the decree (including its supplements) can be found Aleksandr Topchiev (academic secretary of the Presidium of the in: S. Kudryashov, op. cit., pp. 31-45. USSR Academy of Sciences). Since there is no date on the letter, 27. M. Tikhonravov, op. cit. there is some uncertainty over when exactly it was written. Based on available evidence, it was most likely 3 September 1955. See: V. 28. Document from the archives of RKK Energiya. Davyvoda (ed.), Pervyy pilotiruemyy polet. Kniga 1. Rodina Media, 29. Document from the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History. Moscow, pp. 52-53, 2011. 30. M. Keldysh, op. cit., pp. 369-370. 21. M. Tikhonravov, op. cit., p. 93. 31. M. Tikhonravov, op. cit.

The BIS Sino-Russian Technical Forum A Brief History (updated through 2018) copy

DAVID J. SHAYLER, FBIS

In 2016 Space Chronicle published a brief history of the Society’s thor David Baker, who spoke on his personal experiences in the USSR, long-established Technical Forum covering the period from its incep- working with various Soviet department and organisations. Rex Hall tion in the late 1970s through to its 35th annual programme [1]. This (1946-2010), a former President of the Society, was the driving force paper Subscriberupdates that story following the three recent forums held during in establishing the quality and popularity of the Forum over a period the 2016-2018 period, during which 38 authors presented 47 papers of 30 years. to members of the Society. Following on from the success of the 2015 Forum, the programme continued as a two-day event that highlights The 2018 Forum [4] continued the theme of a wide variety of papers its growing popularity. covering not only the former Soviet (now Russian) space programme, but also recent developments in the Chinese and Indian space pro- The 36th Forum in 2016 [2] was planned to coincide with the 25th grammes. One of many highlights from this meeting was a live broad- anniversary, in May of that year, of Helen Sharman’s week-long mission cast of the landing of Soyuz MS-07 via NASA TV – and, following a to the Mir space station. The extended weekend’s activities began with safe touchdown, the Forum attendees raised a glass with a vodka toast an evening reception at Imperial College, London, which featured 13 to the crew… naturally. European space explorers as well as a live link-up with ESA astronaut Tim Peake aboard the ISS. The ensuing two-day Forum also featured The Society has enthusiastically supported the annual Soviet/Rus- a memorable and lively Q&A with Helen Sharman and her fellow Mir sia-Sino Technical Forum since its inception. In 2019 the theme will be crewmembers, former cosmonauts Viktor Afanasayev, Anatoli Artse- Soviet/Russian & Asian lunar exploration. This will be followed in 2020 barsky and Sergei Krikalev. by a celebration of the 60th anniversary of the selection of the first 20 Soviet cosmonauts (1960), the 50th anniversary of the launch of the first The following year, the 37th Forum [3] was dedicated to the mem- Chinese satellite (1970) and the 40th anniversary of the very first BIS ory of engineer and space worker Oleg Sokolov (1945-2016). Oleg Technical Forum (1980). The 2021 theme will reflect the 60th anniver- became the first Russian space worker to formally present a paper at sary of Gagarin’s inaugural human spaceflight (1961) and the 50th an- a Forum, and in the first memorial paper in Oleg’s name, former cos- niversary of the orbiting of Salyut, the world’s first space station (1971). monaut Anatoly Artsebarsky reflected on his experiences in the Soviet Buran programme. The year’s agenda also featured the inaugural Rex The Society always encourages new speakers at the Forum and ex- Hall memorial lecture by SpaceFlight Editor and renowned space au- tends a warm welcome to all members who wish to attend.

35 David Shayler

References

1. The BIS Soviet/Chinese Technical Forum – A Brief History (1980- 3. Sino-Russian Technical Forum, SpaceFlight Vol. 59, August 2017 pp. 2015), David J. Shayler, Space Chronicle, Vol. 69, Supplement 2, pp. 316-317 46-58, 2016 4. 38th BIS Russia-Sino Forum, SpaceFlight Vol. 60, August 2018, Brian 2. Soviet/Chinese Technical Forum, SpaceFlight Vol. 58, August, 2016, Harvey and Ken MacTaggart, pp. 28-30 David J. Shayler, pp. 306-309

SIN0-RUSSIAN TECHNICAL FORUM Papers 2016-2018

Forum No. Dates Chairpersons Papers

• Soyuz 13 and the flight of the 2 astrophysical observatory –Dave Shayler • Story of through contemporary newspaper articles – Tony Quine • Popular participation in space exploration in China and its mediation to soft power – Andrew Thomas • Chinese space science: an update – Brian Harvey • The Soviet Lunar Manned Programmes: A Look From Inside On Their Realization By Eyes Of Ordinary Participant Part I: The -L3 Programme – Oleg Sokolov 20-22 May 2016 • Vostochnyy: Russia’s New – Bart Hendrickx Programme Brian Harvey • Lunar 2015 isolation and spaceflight simulation experiment –Elena Luchitskaya, and Daria Komissarova Coordinator & • Soyuz 11 Another Progress Payment – Andrew Knight 36 Dave Shayler Bert Vis • Operations with Tiangong 1 – Phil Clark • Finding landed Soviet spacecraft on the Moon, Mars and Venus – Brian Harvey 15 papers • The main results of biological experiments on Russian orbital stations and its contribution in the future life support system – Galina S. Nechitailo, IMBP • The Life and Legacy of Vasily Pavlovich Mishin – Asif Siddiqi • The Soviet Lunar Manned Programmes: A Look From Inside On Their Realization By Eyes Of Ordinary Participant Part II: The UR-500K-L1 Programme And Supporting Missions – Oleg Sokolov • A Remarkable Soyuz Crew Emblem – Bert Vis • Photoreconnaissance Updates 2014-2016 – Phil Clark • Behind the Curtain: A view from Inside the Soviet Union – David Baker • The mission of Tim Peake – Erik Seedhouse copy • Reporting the Right Stuff? The Western Press in Moscow during the – Dominic Phelan • The Indian Human Spaceflight Program –Gurbir Singh • Monumental Statues to the Local, Living Cosmonaut in Russia and China: A case study of Kaliningrad 3-4 June 2017 (Russia) and Húludao (China) – Andrew Thomas Programme Brian Harvey • Surveying Soyuz – Dave Shayler Coordinator & • Personal Experience in preparation for the Buran programme – Anatoli Artsebarsky 37 Dave Shayler Bert Vis • Cosmonauts versus Astronauts – Ken MacTaggart • Replacing Soyuz: The “Federatsia” spacecraft – Bart Hendrickx 15 papers • . The Flight of the Heavenly Twins – Andrew Knight • The Shiyan Weixing Programme, 2004-2017 – Phil Clark • The Spektr R Radio Observatory – Brian Harvey Subscriber• The use of space products in Russia and UK, problems and prospect – Alexey Loktionov • Memories from the cockpit: Recollections of a Test Pilot cosmonaut – Anatoli Artsebarsky • Flights of the Blok D Family Upper Stages, 1999-2017 – Phil Clark • Soyuz 22 – The last solo scientific Soyuz –Dave Shayler • Eastern delights – Expanding the Soviet, Russian & Chinese Collections in the BIS Library – Martin Postranecky • My fifty+ years of tracking Russian satellites by radio –Sven Grahn • India and China: Will they compete or collaborate in space? – Gurbir Singh • Aspirations of a Soviet Rocket Man, Oleg Sokolov – Alexey Loktionov • Cosmos 2519 - The Matryoshka Satellite – Phil Clark 2-3 June 2018 • Soyuz 4 & 5 – Andrew Knight Brian Harvey, Programme • Recoveries of Soyuz Spacecraft – Phil Clark Bart Hendrickx Coordinator • A Soviet ? – Dave Shayler 38 & Dave Shayler Bert Vis • Social Networks Found Within Chinese Space Events – Andrew Thomas • Prospective Shenzhou crewing – Brian Harvey 17 papers • Historical parallels of biological space experiments from Soyuz, Salyut and MIR station to Shenzhou flights – Galina Nechitailo • Sleuthing Russian military satellites – Bart Hendrickx • , two decades of service – Dave Shayler • Harbin Institute of Technology and the Chinese space programme – Brian Harvey • Project Azorian and Soviet space observations of the raising of the K129 Soviet ballistic missile submarine – Phil Mills • Operations with Tiangong 2 – Phil Clark

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SPACE CHRONICLE A BRITISH INTERPLANETARY SOCIETY PUBLICATION

Vol. 72 No.1 2019

SOCIAL NETWORKS FOUND Within Chinese Space Events Andrew Thomas

FLIGHTS OF THE BLOK DM FAMILY UPPER STAGES  1999-2017 Phillip S. Clark

 SELECTING CHINA’S ASTRONAUTS copy Bert Vis

THE PATH TO THE FIRST SPUTNIK New Insights Lyubov Vershinina (trans. Bart Hendrickx) SubscriberTHE BIS SINO-RUSSIAN TECHNICAL FORUM David J. Shayler

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