SB SAREX @ AMSAT $STS-78.010
STS-78 SAREX Update and Keps

Silver Spring, Maryland USA
June 24, 1996 @ 22:00 UTC

In addition to continuing work in the Spacelab module, Columbia's
crew yesterday also spent time sharing the progress of its mission.

Payload Commander Susan Helms, KC7NHZ, took time to speak with
students at Eisenhower Middle School in San Antonio, Texas.  The
school has a "Young Astronaut Program" that has had student launch
a model rocket to an altitude of 15,000 feet, and have assembled a
permanent amateur radio station.

Flight controllers woke the crew at 0908 UTC.  Microgravity research
today aboard Columbia is concentrating on the use of the gradient
furnace and the Bubble Drop Particle Unit to study materials
processing, and on studies of human muscles and balance mechanisms.

STS-78 crew members also will have opportunities to exercise and
contact individuals on the ground with the Shuttle Amateur Radio
Experiment (SAREX).

Columbia continues to perform well as it orbits the Earth every
90 minutes, providing a steady workshop for the Life and
Microgravity Spacelab investigations.

Here is the latest Keplerian element set provided by Gil Carman,
WA5NOM, at the NASA/Johnson Space Center:

STS-78
1 23931U 96036A   96176.85343852  .00109680  00000-0  19324-3 0  9074
2 23931  39.0166 341.6067 0007272 301.9883  58.0388 16.01507315   698

Satellite: STS-78
Catalog number: 23931
Epoch time:      96176.85343852   =     yrday.fracday
Element set:     907
Inclination:       39.0166 deg
RA of node:       341.6067 deg
Eccentricity:     .0007272
Arg of perigee:   301.9883 deg
Mean anomaly:      58.0388 deg
Mean motion:   16.01507315 rev/day
Decay rate:    1.09680E-03 rev/day^2
Epoch rev:              69
Checksum:              325

Submitted by (Pat Kilroy, WD8LAQ for) Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO for the
SAREX Working Group

/EX