Arie Olckers is most famous – and almost worldwide – as the co-founder of "Ruimtevaart Filatelie Club Nederland” (RFC) (Space Philately Society of the Netherlands), founded in July 1976. He became its first treasurer and six years later its president, which he enthousiastically stayed for more than 28 years. Already before that, 37 years ago, he published the first issue of the society’s magazine The Newsletter, which in those days was only available in a limited, type written edition. Later it changed into a stencilled format A5 edition, still in black and white. Over the years some colour was introduced and i... Read more »
On May 15, 2013 at 21:38 UTC the "Atlas-5” rocket-carrier was launched from Cape Canaveral launch site of US Air Force. The launch was performed by United Launch Alliance supported by the 45th Space Wing of US Air Force. The rocket equipped with the "Centaur” booster orbited the GPS 2F-4 navigation satellite.
On May 14, 2013, at 16:01 UTC the Russian "Proton-M” rocket-carrier was launched from Baykonur Cosmodrome. The rocket equipped with the "Briz-M” booster orbited the "Eutelsat W3D” European telecommunication satellite.
On May 14, 2013 at 02:31 UTC the Russian "Soyuz TMA-07M” landing capsule landed safely at a distance of 146 kilometers to South-East from the city of Dzhezkazgan, Kazakhstan. The spacecraft delivered to Earth the 3 members of ISS’s Expedition 35 – Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko (center), Canadian astronaut Christopher Hadfield (left) and American astronaut Thomas Marshburn.
Photo by NASA
They spent in space 145 days, 14 hours, 18 minutes. Three other ISS crew members – Russian cosmonauts Pavel Vinogradov and Alexander Misurkin as well as American astron... Read more »
On May 13, 2013 at 23:08 UTC (on May 14 at 03:08 Moscow time) the Russian "Soyuz TMA-07M” spacecraft undocked from the International Space Station to deliver to Earth the 3 members of Expedition 35 – Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko, Canadian astronaut Christopher Hadfield and American astronaut Thomas Marshburn.
On May 11, 2013 American astronauts Tomas Marshburn and Christopher Cassidy conducted an emergency spacewalk to inspect and replace a device believed to be the source of an ammonia leak in the orbiting laboratory's power system. The space walkers successfully installed a new pump controller box, which contains the mechanical systems that drive the cooling functions, after removing the old one suspected of leaking flakes of frozen ammonia coolant two days earlier. The spacewalk, the third for both Cassidy and Marshburn, who conducted two spacewalks together in July 2009, began at 12:44 UTC. It lasted five and a half hours, an hour less than expected.
On May 7, 2013 at 02:06 UTC the "Vega” (VV02) rocket-carrier was launched from Kourou Cosmodrome in French Guiana. The rocket orbited 3 satellites. Two Earth observation satellites, ESA's "Proba-V” and Vietnamese "VNREDSat 1A”, and Estonia's first satellite ESTCube 1, were released into different orbits.
On May 01, 2013 at 16:06 UTC (on May 02 at 00:06 Beijing time) the "Long March-3B” rocket-carrier was launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province. The rocket orbited the "Zhongxing-11" communications satellite. "Zhongxing-11" will be mainly used in providing commercial communications services for users in the Asia-Pacific region.
On April 26, 2013 at 12:26 UTC the Russian "Progress M-19M” unmanned supply spacecraft docked to the International Space Station despite its navigation aerial malfunction. The docking was conducted in an automatic mode where the failed antenna was not necessary. The spacecraft was docked to the "Zvezda” module. The spacecraft carried 2366 kilograms of cargo for the six-member ISS crew from Russia, the United States and Canada.
On April 26, 2013 at 05:23 UTC the "Soyuz-2.1b” rocket-carrier was launched from Russian northern Plesetsk Cosmodrome. The rocket equipped with the "Fregat” booster orbited Glonass-M navigation satellite. GLONASS is Russia’s answer to the US Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use.
