Space History for October 16

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1909
J. H. Metcalf discovered asteroid #690 Wratislavia.

1935
H. Van Gent discovered asteroid #1879 Broederstroom.

1938
Y. Vaisala discovered asteroid #1499 Pori and #1500 Jyvaskyla.

1941
L. Oterma discovered asteroid #2159 Kukkamaki.

1956
Born, James H. Newman PhD (at Chuuk, Trust Territory of the Pacific), NASA astronaut (STS 51, STS 69, STS 88, STS 109; over 43d 10h total time in spaceflight)

Astronaut James H. Newman, STS-109 mission specialist, NASA photo (July 1995)
Source: Wikipedia (spaceflight.nasa.gov killed 25 Feb 2021)
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1961
Goethe Link Observatory discovered asteroid #1996 Adams.

1963
Goethe Link Observatory discovered asteroid #2059 Baboquivari.

1963 22:24:00 EDT (GMT -5:00:00)
Two secret US military satellites, Vela 1A and Vela 1B, were launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida to monitor nuclear weapons explosions in space.
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

1965
Purple Mountain Observatory discovered asteroids #2503 Liaoning and #3513.

1969
L. Chernykh discovered asteroids #2092 Sumiana and #2931 Mayakovsky.

1969
Soyuz 6 returned to Earth after cosmonauts Shonin and Kubasov performed welding experiments and group manuevers with Soyuz 7 and 8.
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

1976
Soyuz 23 returned cosmonauts Rozhedstvensky and Zudov to Earth in an emergency splashdown at night in a blizzard after failing to dock with the Salyut 5 space station.

Soyuz 23 was a manned Soviet mission launched 14 October 1976 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome with cosmonauts Rozhedstvensky and Zudov on board. It was intended to dock with the Salyut 5 space station, but the mission failed due to a fault of the main antenna of the Igla rendezvous system. Sensors indicated an incorrect lateral velocity, causing unnecessary firing of the thrusters during rendezvous. The automatic system was turned off, but no fuel remained for a manual docking by the crew. An emergency splashdown was done at night in a blizzard in Lake Tengiz on 16 October 1976. Recovery crews did not find the capsule until the next morning, and were surprised to find the crew alive.
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

1979
N. Chernykh discovered asteroid #3661.

1982
Astronomers David Jewitt and G. Edward Danielson using a CCD camera with the 200" (5.1 m) Hale telescope at Mt. Palomar Observatory were the first to detect Halley's Comet on its thirtieth recorded return.

In 2000 years of observations since 240 BCE, Chinese records have never missed a return of Halley's Comet. From those records, Cowell and Crommelin computed the dates of perihelion passage as:

1. 15 May 240 BCE
2. 20 May 163 BCE
3. 15 August 87 BCE
4. 8 October 12 BCE
5. 26 January 66 CE
6. 25 March 141 CE
7. 6 April 218 CE
8. 7 April 295 CE
9. 13 February 374 CE
10. 3 July 451 CE
11. 15 November 530 CE
12. 26 March 607 CE
13. 26 November 684 CE
14. 10 June 760 CE
15. 25 February 837 CE
16. 17 July 912 CE
17. 2 September 989 CE
18. 25 March 1066 CE
19. 19 April 1145 CE
20. 10 September 1222 CE
21. 22.7 October 1301 CE
22. 8.8 November 1378 CE
23. 8.2 January 1456 CE
24. 25.8 August 1531 CE
25. 26.9 October 1607 CE
26. 14.8 September 1682 CE
27. 12.6 March 1758 CE
28. 15.9 November 1835 CE
29. 19.7 April 1910 CE
30. 9 February 1986 CE

Note that the precision of the dates from passage 21 onward could be computed with increased accuracy because of additional observations. However, at the time of their computation, the 1986 passage was still a future event. (The actual date was found from other sources.)

On 19 April 607, Comet 1P/607 H1 (Halley) approached within 0.0898 AU (13.5 million km, 8.4 million miles) of Earth. On 374-April-1.9, it had approached closer, having come within 0.0884 AU (13.2 million km, 8.2 million miles), and on 837-April-10.5, it became the third closest approach in history prior to 1900, passing within 0.0334 AU (5 million km, 3.1 million miles).

On 16 October 1982, astronomers David Jewitt and G. Edward Danielson using a CCD camera with the 5.1 m Hale telescope at Mt. Palomar Observatory were the first to detect Halley's Comet on its thirtieth recorded return.

1982
Z. Vavrova discovered asteroids #3069 and #3515.

1985
Intel introduced the 32-bit 80386 microcomputer chip. After it had long been obsolete as a personal computer CPU, the 80386 or one of many derivatives were common in aerospace technology.
ref: en.wikipedia.org

1998
Died, Jon Postel, American Internet pioneer

Jonathan Bruce Postel (6 August 1943 - 16 October 1998) made many significant contributions to Internet standards. He is principally known for being the Editor of the RFC document series from the IETF; he also initiated and ran the number assignment clearinghouse, the IANA, from its inception to his death. He wrote and edited many important RFC's, including RFC's 0791-0793, which define the basic protocols of the Internet protocol suite, and RFC 2223 (Instructions to RFC Authors).
ref: en.wikipedia.org

2002 08:13:00 CDT (GMT -5:00:00)
NASA's STS 112 (Atlantis 26) undocked from the ISS to close the International Space Station Flight 9A to install and activate the S1 (S-One) Truss.

STS 112 was launched 7 October 2002 on a flight delayed from 22 March, 4 April, 22 August, 28 September, and 2 October due to payload delays, then SSME problems. It docked with the International Space Station (ISS) on 9 October carrying a crew of five Americans and one Russian, undocked on 16 October, and landed at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 18 October 2002, ending the mission at the 10 day, 19 hour, 58 minute mark.

The STS 112 crew - Commander Jeff Ashby, Pilot Pam Melroy and Mission Specialists Sandy Magnus, Piers Sellers, David Wolf and Fyodor Yurchikhin continued the on-orbit construction of the International Space Station with the delivery and installation of the S-1 (S-One) Truss. The S1, the third piece of the station's 11-piece Integrated Truss Structure, was attached to the starboard end of the S0 (S-Zero) Truss on Flight Day 4, which extended the truss system of the exterior rail line with a 14 meter, 13 ton girder. The crew also tested a manual cart on the rails. The cart, named CETA (Crew and Equipment Transportation Aid), was designed to increase mobility of crew and equipment during the later installation phases. The STS 112 crew performed three spacewalks (10 October, 12 October and 14 October) to outfit and activate the new component. The crew also transferred cargo between the two vehicles, and used the shuttle's thruster jets during two maneuvers to raise the station's orbit.

STS 112 was also the first shuttle mission to use a camera on the External Tank. The color video camera provided a live view of the launch to flight controllers and NASA TV viewers.
ref: www.nasa.gov

2003
Yang Liwei landed safely in China after 21 hours in orbit, completing China's first human space mission.
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

2004 04:16:00 GMT
The ISS Expedition 10 crew docked successfully at the International Space Station.

Tucked inside the Soyuz TMA-5 spacecraft during a flawless launch were ISS Expedition 10 commander Leroy Chiao, flight engineer Salizhan Sharipov and Russian Space Forces cosmonaut Yuri Shargin, a space station visitor, as they began a two-day trip toward the space station. Shargin had a packed schedule of science experiments for the eight days he was to spend aboard the ISS. Chiao and Sharipov would spend the next six months living aboard the space station during their mission.

Expedition 10's on-time takeoff took place at 11:06:26 PM EDT on 13 October (0306:26 14 October GMT), though it was 9:09:26 in the morning at the launch's Site 254 staging ground at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The launch pad was also the starting point for the world's first human spaceflight by Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in 1961.

Chiao, Sharipov, and Shargin, docked successfully with the Pirs module at 12:16 AM EDT (0416 GMT) on 16 October 2004. The docking maneuver was not without incident, however: Six minutes before, with the Soyuz under autonomous control and within 200 meters (656 feet) of the station, the approaching spacecraft's speed rose considerably, exceeding normal flight velocity for docking maneuvers, setting off the appropriate alarms. But Sharipov, who had commanded the Soyuz for the two-day trip to the station, calmly took manual control, backed it away, then brought it in to complete the procedure smoothly.

After spending just over three hours conducting leak checks between the Soyuz spacecraft and the ISS, the Expedition 10 crew entered the station at 3:25 AM EDT (0725 GMT).
ref: nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov

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