SB SAREX @ AMSAT $STS-78.021 STS-78 SAREX Bulletin #21 Silver Spring, Maryland USA June 30, 1996 @ 02:00 UTC Columbia's crew performed orbital high-fives when told of the decision to extend the mission by one day to allow for additional science data gathering. The call to the STS-78 crew came at 13:24 UTC yesterday from Astronaut Chris Hadfield in Mission Control while the payload crew worked on many of the 40 experiments that make up the Life and Microgravity Spacelab mission. Columbia's twentieth space flight is now likely to break the Space Shuttle endurance record. Endeavour currently holds that mark on the STS-67 Astro-2 mission which flew in March 1995. That flight lasted 16 days, 15 hours. The current mission is now planned to last 16 days, 21 hours. The record will be broken as the crew prepares for reentry in the early morning hours of July 7. Columbia's current orbit is circular at 168 statute miles, circling the Earth every 90 minutes. Here is the latest orbital element set from AMSAT member Gil Carman, WA5NOM, in Houston: STS-78 1 23931U 96036A 96181.96411433 .00105182 00000-0 16973-3 0 9129 2 23931 39.0113 307.3007 0005684 333.0653 27.0064 16.02876374 1513 Satellite: STS-78 Catalog number: 23931 Epoch time: 96181.96411433 = (29-Jun-96 23:08:19.47 UTC) Element set: 912 Inclination: 39.0113 deg RA of node: 307.3007 deg Space Shuttle Flight STS-78 Eccentricity: .0005684 Keplerian element set JSC-912 Arg of perigee: 333.0653 deg from NASA flight Day 10 vector Mean anomaly: 27.0064 deg Mean motion: 16.02876374 rev/day Gil Carman Decay rate: 1.05182e-03 rev/day^2 NASA Johnson Space Center Epoch rev: 151 Checksum: 278 Reports have been received asking why Columbia has not been heard on voice on 145.550 MHz FM when over South America and other areas. In addition to the crew's busy schedule, another reason could be due to when their sleep periods occur. Here is an excerpt from the STS-78 activity plan from the NASA Television Schedule, Rev E modified for UTC: LAUNCH OCCURRED AT 14:49 UTC ON THURSDAY, JUNE 20, 1996 (DAY 172) ORBIT SUBJECT MET UTC ----------------------------- SUNDAY, JUNE 30 ----------------------- FD 11 155 CREW WAKE UP 09/15:40 06:29 UTC 166 CREW SLEEP 10/07:15 22:04 UTC ----------------------------- MONDAY, JULY 1 ------------------------ FD 12 171 CREW WAKE UP 10/15:15 06:04 UTC 181 CREW SLEEP 11/06:50 21:39 UTC ----------------------------- TUESDAY, JULY 2 ----------------------- FD 13 187 CREW WAKE UP 11/14:50 05:39 UTC 197 CREW SLEEP 12/06:25 21:14 UTC ----------------------------- WEDNESDAY, JULY 3 --------------------- FD 14 203 CREW WAKE UP 12/14:25 05:14 UTC 213 CREW SLEEP 13/06:00 20:49 UTC ----------------------------- THURSDAY, JULY 4 ---------------------- FD 15 219 CREW WAKE UP 13/14:00 04:49 UTC 229 CREW SLEEP 14/05:50 20:39 UTC ----------------------------- FRIDAY, JULY 5 ------------------------ FD 16 234 CREW WAKE UP 14/13:50 04:39 UTC 245 CREW SLEEP 15/05:45 20:34 UTC ----------------------------- SATURDAY, JULY 6 ---------------------- FD 17 250 CREW WAKE UP 15/13:45 04:34 UTC 258 CREW SLEEP 16/05:45 20:34 UTC ----------------------------- SUNDAY, JULY 7 ------------------------ FD 18 264 CREW WAKE UP 16/13:45 04:34 UTC 269 DEORBIT BURN 16/20:53 11:42 UTC 270 KSC LANDING 16/21:49 12:38 UTC Submitted by (Pat Kilroy, WD8LAQ for) Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO for the SAREX Working Group /EX