Topics:

• Space launches 2006 – it is not boring – I promise! 
• Overall launch rate
• Launch rate by source
• Spacecraft categories – elements of society’s space-based infrastucture
• An old-timer flies again
• The Telescience Support Unit

Space launches 2006 – it is not a boring subject – I promise!
At this time of the year I usually look back at the past year’s launches into space – long after everybody else. But it is an interesting exercise and shows how difficult it is to compare space events from year to year. The challenge is one of classification. In the old days the launching country was also usually the owner of the spacecraft. Nowadays, commercial entities buy launches from various sources, and a particular launch can carry two spacecraft from two different commercial organizations. So, how do you count that launch? 

My approach is to count a launch coming from the country where the launch vehicle – or most of the launch vehicle is manufactured. Therefore all launches from launch sites in the former Soviet Union plus those from the Sealaunch platform are regarded as “successors” to those of the Soviet Union. When the Soyuz starts flying from Kourou I intend to include those in the same category.

Defining categories is another difficulty. Nowadays, armed forces outsource telecom services to commercial operators. “Technical tests” may be prototypes of new observation spacecraft. Anyhow, I have tried my best.

First, let us look at the overall launch rate since 1957 which rose above 60 launches per year in 2006.

In this graph the rapid rise at the beginning of the space age and the ensuing 25 year almost constant launch rate of about two satellite launches per week. After the end of the cold war the launch rate started declining. It seems that the launch rate has now, possibly, leveled off at half the Cold War rate.

By looking at the source of the launches we add a new dimension. The three launch sources in the graph below are “Former Soviet Union” Red, the U.S Blue, and “other” Green.

“The former Soviet Union” (FSU) again dominates space launches while U.S. and “other” sources are about equal in launch rate. During the cold war the Soviet Union greatly dominated space traffic, mainly because they used short-lived photographic, recoverable reconnaissance satellites instead of long-lived, electro-optical observation satellites gradually brought online by the U.S. The decline is “former Soviet Union” launch rate after the end of the Cold War about 1990 can be seen as a measure of the sheer inertia and backlog of manufactured spacecraft that eventually all were launched. Meanwhile, FSU space enterprizes picked up outside customers.

Let us finally take a look at spacecraft categories:

If you add up telecom satellites, civil observation, and navigation satellites you reach the number 34, which is more than half the total launch rate of 62. These three categories represent space-based services and infrastructure that most affect the ordinary citizen. Isn’t that what we space enthusiasts always have wished would happen – that space matters? We may marvel at exciting scientific discoveries by automatic spacecraft, but the seemingly humdrum services of society’s space-based infrastructure is also something to be proud of.

A real old-timer still flies

Fourty-seven years ago – on 15 May 1960 – the prototype of Yuri Gagarin’s spaceship was launched on its first, unmanned test flight under the name “Spaceship-Satellite 1” or “Sputnik-4” (see picture below). It was supposed to stay in orbit three days, but when its retrorocket fired it did so in the wrong direction and the spacecraft entered a higher orbit. Later, the spacecraft did well as a manned spacecraft but the first test flight in May 1960 was also a test of the reconnaissance satellite version of Gagarin’s spaceship – Zenit.

Hundreds of Zenits were manufactured at the Central Specialized Design Bureau and its associated “Progress” factory in Samara in southern Russia. I think that this facility must be the space factory that has manufactured the largest number of spacecraft and launch vehicles. By the way, a Swedish “Royal Technology Mission” will travel to Samara and the CSDB next month.

The Telescience Support Unit
Also, in September, a modernized version of the craft that flew in May 1960 will be launched from Baikonur in Kazakstan under the name Foton – a microgravity research facility carrying instruments from ESA. Foton-M3 also carries a telemetry and command unit (The Telescience Support Unit, TSU) to interact with the instruments developed by SSC and operated from our ground station at Esrange during the two-week flight.

Best Wishes

Sven Grahn