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STS-56

STS-56
STS-56 ATLAS-2 pallet.jpg
ATLAS-2 in Discovery's payload bay
Mission type Scientific
Operator NASA
COSPAR ID 1993-023A
SATCAT № 22621
Mission duration 9 days, 06 hours, 08 minutes, 24 seconds
Distance travelled 6,202,407 kilometers (3,853,997 mi)
Orbits completed 148
Spacecraft properties
Spacecraft Space Shuttle Discovery
Landing mass 93,683 kilograms (206,536 lb)
Payload mass 7,026 kilograms (15,490 lb)
Crew
Crew size 5
Members Kenneth D. Cameron
Stephen S. Oswald
C. Michael Foale
Kenneth D. Cockrell
Ellen Ochoa
Start of mission
Launch date 8 April 1993, 05:29:00 (1993-04-08UTC05:29Z) UTC
Launch site Kennedy LC-39B
End of mission
Landing date 17 April 1993, 11:37:19 (1993-04-17UTC11:37:20Z) UTC
Landing site Kennedy SLF Runway 33
Orbital parameters
Reference system Geocentric
Regime Low Earth
Perigee 291 kilometres (181 mi)
Apogee 299 kilometres (186 mi)
Inclination 57.0 degrees
Period 90.4 min

Sts-56-patch.png Sts-56 crew.jpg
Left to right - Seated: Oswald, Cameron; Standing: Cockrell, Foale, Ochoa


Space Shuttle program
← STS-54 STS-55

Sts-56-patch.png Sts-56 crew.jpg
Left to right - Seated: Oswald, Cameron; Standing: Cockrell, Foale, Ochoa

STS-56 was a Space Shuttle Discovery mission to perform special experiments. The mission was launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 8 April 1993.

The primary payload of the flight was the Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science-2 (ATLAS-2), designed to collect data on the relationship between the sun's energy output and Earth's middle atmosphere and how these factors affect the ozone layer. It included six instruments mounted on a Spacelab pallet in the cargo bay, with the seventh mounted on the wall of the bay in two Get Away Special canisters. Atmospheric instruments included the Atmospheric Trace Molecule Spectroscopy (ATMOS) experiment, the Millimeter Wave Atmospheric Sounder (MAS), and the Shuttle Solar Backscatter Ultraviolet/A (SSBUV/A) spectrometer (on the cargo bay wall). Solar science instruments were the Solar Spectrum Measurement (SOLSPEC) instrument, the Solar Ultraviolet Irradiance Monitor (SUSIM), and the Active Cavity Radiometer (ACR) and Solar Constant (SOLCON) experiments.

ATLAS-2 is one element of NASA's Mission to Planet Earth program. All seven ATLAS-2 instruments first flew on ATLAS-1 during STS-45, and flew a third time in late 1994 on STS-66.

On 11 April, the crew used the remote manipulator arm to deploy the Shuttle Point Autonomous Research Tool for Astronomy-201 (SPARTAN-201), a free-flying science instrument platform designed to study velocity and acceleration of the solar wind and observe the sun's corona. Collected data was stored on tape for playback after return to Earth. SPARTAN-201 was retrieved on 13 April.


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