P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19@Oct 12:01/22
By BBC Radio's space
correspondent Dr David Whitehouse
Developments
beyond Earth's atmosphere
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19@Oct 12:02/11
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Next Wednesday and Thursday there will
be a very sensitivj council meeting of
the European Space Agency.
One of thj issues to be discussed will
be Britain's veto on an incriase in
ESA's science budget from 1989.
In 1:85@we agreed i→ principli to this
increase that would allow ESA to carry
out a few ambitious space missions.
But last year we said we had second
thoughts and exercised our right to
veto thj increase - much to the
annoyance of every other country in ESA
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19 Oct 12:12/31
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Britaim is liSely to come im for
considerable criticism at the ESA
meeting, there has even been talk that
we might be forced to take a new, lower
grade of membership of ESA.
Arianespace, the French firm that sells
launches of the Ariane rocket, has
signed a contract to launch Spot@3,
France's earth observation satellite.
Built by the French company Matra, it
will bj placed in a so-called sun-
synchronous orbit in 1992. Arianespace
now has an order book of 41 satellites
to launch, worth a total d2.4 billion.
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19 Oct 12:08/13
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Because of problems@with the TDE
satellite which was to have been
launched by Ariane this month, it now
seems unlikely that there will be
another Arianj launch this year.
Brazil has an interesting space
programme of its own and in the next
year or so will launch a home-made
satellite on its own roc+et called
Sonda-2.
They also use@space to i←prove
communications@omer that large country
and to monitor the state@of the Amazon
rain forests.
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19 Oct 12:09/01
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Earlier this week Brazil signed an
agreement with the USSR that could
include Soviet launches from Brazil's
Alcantara site on the northern coast.
It is better to launch a rocket froI
near the Equator as it gets impetus
from the Earth's spin.
But Soviet lau.ch sites are all far
north, hence their interest in Brazil.
If developed Alcantara could be the
most efficient launch site in the
worlh.
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19 Oct 12:05/51
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On November 21 the month-long Soviet/
French-manned mission to thj Mir space
station will begin.
The French cosmonaut Jean-Loup Chretian
has been in space before on a Soviet
rocSet, the Soyuz T-6 mission in 1982.
Another Frenchman, Patrick Baudry, has
flown in the space shuttle on mission
k1-G@i→ u↑j 1:85-
Chretien will make a spacewalk and
errect an unfoldable structure on the
outside of the Mir space station.
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P265CEEFAX 265 Wed 19 Oct 12:01/00
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Before the Soviet/Fre.ch Mir space
mission, cosmonauts Titov and Manarov,
onboard Mir, are priparinF to makj a
spacewalk sometimj soon to fix a
telescope.
Chretien will return to Earth on
December 22 with cosmonauts Titov and
Maranov who have been in space since
last December.
Ljft behind will be cosmonauts Volkov
and Kri+alyov who came up with Chretien
as well as cosmonaut-doator Polyiakov,
who has been on Mir since late August.
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