Author Topic: LIVE: Delta II - Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - July 2, 2014  (Read 158741 times)

Offline ugordan

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Could a Delta II even be ready to fly by "mid-2014"?

The article does state that's realistically the earliest date for a launch.

Offline Antares

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Are there any other spacecraft in line to go into the A-train orbit?  That's would be an excellent opportunity for a dual manifest - and probably the only one likely.

AIUI, OSTP is who has the say on whether a spacecraft can go on a government-furnished launcher, and the mission project has to request it first.  Also AIUI, other commercial providers have the right to protest OSTP's decision with the GAO.
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Offline TheMightyM

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Are there any other spacecraft in line to go into the A-train orbit?  That's would be an excellent opportunity for a dual manifest - and probably the only one likely.

SMAP, scheduled to launch in November 2014, might be a possibility.

Offline ugordan

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Well, the Soil Moisture Active and Passive mission wants to go to a sun-sync orbit, but a 6 AM/PM one so I don't know if that's doable.

Offline William Graham

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Minotaur-IV could be an alternative, if no other acceptable launch vehicles are available (e.g. LADEE on Minotaur V). The Minotaur I mentioned above is likely not powerful enough.
I meant IV. Posted that when I was still waking up, and in hindsight it was probably a bad summary.

What do you mean by too big? In terms of lift capacity or cost?

Capacity mostly, but smaller rockets are generally cheaper. That said, the increased fixed costs of a Delta II launch would probably make it more expensive than an F9 - not sure how much a Delta goes for these days. But ULA are still marketing it, so presumably they believe that it is still competitive.

Offline kevin-rf

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #25 on: 02/11/2012 08:23 pm »
I think this issue with an F-9 or even an Antares is they have not yet flown often enough.

I wonder if the Taurus XL issues where part of the reason for Orbital's Taurus II name change.
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Offline kevin-rf

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #26 on: 02/11/2012 11:52 pm »
If OCO-2 flies on a Delta II, would it be a three solid Delta 7320, or would it use three Delta II heavy solids and have a different designation?
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Offline Antares

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #27 on: 02/12/2012 12:35 am »
I think the only certified version with big GEMs is the 79xx.
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Offline kevin-rf

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #28 on: 02/12/2012 11:33 am »
The reason I asked on that, is I thought in all the Delta II discussions the only remaining GEM's where the large GEM-46's.
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Offline William Graham

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #29 on: 02/12/2012 11:48 am »
The reason I asked on that, is I thought in all the Delta II discussions the only remaining GEM's where the large GEM-46's.
Delta IIH can't fly from Vandenberg, and I believe ULA is no longer offering Delta II launches from Canaveral (in any case, OCO-2 would have to fly from Vandenberg*). They have said that GEM-40s can be produced if necessary.


*Actually there have been a few SSO launches from Canaveral in the past (using early Thor-Delta configurations), and although I haven't done the maths, a 7920H could probably (theoretically) put OCO-2 up from Canaveral if necessary, but that's beside the point
« Last Edit: 02/12/2012 11:50 am by GW_Simulations »

Offline marsman2020

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #30 on: 02/12/2012 11:45 pm »
They should have pulled the Glory contract and dual-manifested Glory and OCO-2 on a Delta II after the original OCO failure.

Especially when it became clear that Orbital had no intent to actually address all of the issues that came out of the OCO MIB report (no change was made to the flawed design of the frangible joints on the payload fairing).

Quote
Does this mean the end of Taurus?

9 launches in 18 years with a 33% failure rate.  Who in their right mind would manifest their payload on that?
« Last Edit: 02/12/2012 11:51 pm by marsman2020 »

Offline Jim

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #31 on: 02/13/2012 12:52 am »
They should have pulled the Glory contract and dual-manifested Glory and OCO-2 on a Delta II after the original OCO failure.


Yeah, right.  You have all the hindsight.  There were no more Delta II's at the time nor a DPAF available, which is still not available even though Delta II is.

Offline Antares

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #32 on: 02/13/2012 01:06 am »
They should have pulled the Glory contract and dual-manifested Glory and OCO-2 on a Delta II after the original OCO failure.

Especially when it became clear that Orbital had no intent to actually address all of the issues that came out of the OCO MIB report (no change was made to the flawed design of the frangible joints on the payload fairing).

All 4 NASA MIB recommendations were mitigated, and hundreds of people participated in RTF reviews and decisions.

Your statements are somewhere between FUD and lies.
« Last Edit: 02/13/2012 01:06 am by Antares »
If I like something on NSF, it's probably because I know it to be accurate.  Every once in a while, it's just something I agree with.  Facts generally receive the former.

Offline marsman2020

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #33 on: 02/13/2012 01:20 am »
They should have pulled the Glory contract and dual-manifested Glory and OCO-2 on a Delta II after the original OCO failure.

Especially when it became clear that Orbital had no intent to actually address all of the issues that came out of the OCO MIB report (no change was made to the flawed design of the frangible joints on the payload fairing).

All 4 NASA MIB recommendations were mitigated, and hundreds of people participated in RTF reviews and decisions.

Your statements are somewhere between FUD and lies.

The NASA Engineering Safety Center flagged the failure of the frangible joints to completely separate as a red risk - probability of occurrence 11-50%, impact - loss of mission in NESC-RP-10-00630, "Assess Qualification of the Taurus Fairing Frangible Joint System", dated May 27, 2010.

As far as I am aware the redesign from hot gas to cold gas on the separation system did not include changes to the frangible joints. 

Per the NESC report, qualification of the frangible joint *prior to* the OCO failure was based on a total of *3* firings, which yields a statistical reliability of 36% on a 95% confidence interval (!!).  Typical qualification programs for launch vehicle pyrotechnic devices include 10s of firings.

That's what the taxpayers got for their money when they paid Orbital ~$50 million for the OCO launch services contact.

Offline deltaV

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #34 on: 02/13/2012 03:56 am »
Why doesn't NASA charge launch providers (or their insurers) for the value of the payloads it loses to launch failures? I would think charging for failure would be a simpler and more effective way to ensure reliability than mountains of paperwork.

Offline Jim

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #35 on: 02/13/2012 11:27 am »
Why doesn't NASA charge launch providers (or their insurers) for the value of the payloads it loses to launch failures? I would think charging for failure would be a simpler and more effective way to ensure reliability than mountains of paperwork.

Then nobody would fly several hundred million dollar spacecraft.

Also, do you know that it is actually "mountains of paperwork?"

Offline kevin-rf

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - July, 2014
« Reply #36 on: 08/06/2013 03:45 pm »
http://www.nasa.gov/press/2013/august/nasa-administrator-views-atmospheric-science-satellite-meets-media-in-arizona/#.UgEZHI1JOAg

NASA Administrator Views Atmospheric Science Satellite, Meets Media in Arizona

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden will visit an Orbital Sciences Corp. facility in Gilbert, Ariz. on Friday, Aug. 9, to view progress on the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-2) satellite.

At 8:15 a.m. MST, Bolden and Orbital CEO David Thompson will tour the company’s satellite manufacturing and clean room facility where the OCO-2 satellite is under construction. They will speak with reporters at 9:15 a.m., following the tour.

Their remarks and media availability will not be broadcast live on NASA Television or the agency's website. Media interested in participating must contact Barron Beneski at [email protected] or 703-406-5228 for credentialing information no later than 5 p.m. EDT (3 p.m. MST) Thursday, Aug. 8.

OCO-2 will be NASA’s first dedicated Earth remote sensing satellite to study atmospheric carbon dioxide from space. OCO-2 will collect global measurements of carbon dioxide with the precision, resolution, and coverage needed to characterize sources and sinks on regional scales, and quantify carbon dioxide variability over the seasonal cycles annually. OCO-2 is targeted to launch next year.

For more information about Orbital Sciences Corporation, visit:
http://www.orbital.com

For more information about OCO-2, visit:
http://oco.jpl.nasa.gov/
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Offline kevin-rf

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - July, 2014
« Reply #37 on: 08/06/2013 04:13 pm »
https://twitter.com/OrbitalSciences/statuses/364771746546589696
Quote
#OCO-2 is next Earth Science spacecraft for @NASA to come out of #Gilbert plant following successful #Landsat8 deployment for @NASA_Landsat

https://twitter.com/OrbitalSciences/statuses/364770758515367937
Quote
More information on #OCO-2 spacecraft that we are designing, building and testing in #Gilbert, AZ for @NASAJPL http://www.orbital.com/SatellitesSpace/ScienceTechnology/OCO/

btw. Does anyone have an easy way to convert twitter tweets to posts here. Using the embed options results in garbly gook, and copy and paste loses the formatting.
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Offline LouScheffer

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #38 on: 08/06/2013 08:17 pm »
Why doesn't NASA charge launch providers (or their insurers) for the value of the payloads it loses to launch failures? I would think charging for failure would be a simpler and more effective way to ensure reliability than mountains of paperwork.

Then the launch providers would simply purchase insurance, and pass the cost on to NASA.  If that is the intention, it would be better for NASA to purchase insurance directly.

In many ways this makes a lot of sense.  High reliability launchers would be able to get cheaper insurance, quantifying the advantage of reliability.  Also there would then be a clear path to a replacement spacecraft in case of a loss.   It's not even much more expensive in some large scale view - say insurance for a $400M mission on a 90% rocket costs $60M ( http://www.casact.org/pubs/forum/00fforum/00ff047.pdf says the premiums range from 7% to 15%).  Then for $460M you get a working mission.  As of now you get 9/10 of a mission for $400M, or $444M per working mission, with no assurance of getting the replacement funded if the first one crashes.

On the other hand, self-insurance is usually cheaper than regular insurance, in the long run and if you can afford the losses.  (After all, the insurance company's profit comes from the difference.)  And although the US government can afford the losses, it's not clear NASA can.  So it might make sense for the military to self-insure, but NASA to buy insurance.

Offline Jim

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Re: Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) - Feb, 2013
« Reply #39 on: 08/06/2013 09:55 pm »
And although the US government can afford the losses, it's not clear NASA can.  So it might make sense for the military to self-insure, but NASA to buy insurance.

The other way around.  NASA flies mostly one of a kind spacecraft vs constellations of satellites.  It makes more sense in self insuring.

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