Minutes of July 13 Oklahoma Space Alliance Meeting
Oklahoma Space Alliance met June 8, 2024, at the Cyber Hall and Gaming Lounge at Norman Computers in Norman, Oklahoma. Attending were Adam Hemphill, Mark Deaver, John Northcutt, Kevin Sampson, Tim Scott, Dave Sheely, and Syd Henderson OSA President Adam Hemphill presided over the meeting Adam presented an update containing links to material covered in the meeting and this is online at https://osa.nss.org/Update2407.pdf so I’ll cover the details that aren’t covered there.
Why is China doing static rocket tests within a building? [This refers to the static test of Long March 10 in June. ‘Tis still a mystery.]
Ariane 6 did have problems reducing the orbit of the second stage so it will stay in orbit and will be doing an uncontrolled reentry quite a while in the future.
If NASA does mothball ISS, as has been proposed, there could be a potential problem with space debris hitting the mothballed space station.
We watched a video of Tianlong 3’s accidental launch, brief burst of freedom, and subsequent crash. The private company that created it had previously successfully reached orbit with Tianlong 2.
Only a small part of the pallet of batteries from the ISS dropped through the roof of the man who is suing NASA. The whole pallet weighed over a ton but thankfully most of it burnt up on reentry.
Space piracy could include taking control of orbiting satellites.
SpaceX had a second stage failure while launching twenty Starlink satellites. These communications satellites were released and they will try to boost them to a higher orbit. Rockets on Starlink satellites are low-thrust. [It looks like the satellites were allowed to burn up.] For the moment the United States has no capacity to launch people to the ISS. [SpaceX has resumed launches and will launch a crew to the Space Station at the end of August.]
This Week @ NASA apparently stopped on May 31 so we had to look elsewhere for space news.
The upper stage of a Long March 6A is creating orbital debris. This is not due to the upper stage breaking up. The pieces of debris are tiny and may be insulation.
--Minutes By OSA Secretary Syd Henderson
Contact person for Oklahoma Space Alliance is Claire McMurray.
PO Box 1003
Norman, OK 73070
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