Yesterday David Bishop posted an observation of a satellite that passed near a galaxy he was looking at. I have identified the object as 74 56D, the Molniya 2-10 rocket: 1 07382U 74056 D 95088.86057228 .00069886 -49316-6 10065-3 0 3839 2 07382 62.4717 350.2833 6959628 282.8006 13.3438 2.77483788 33950 *** 95 Mar 28 Tue evening *** Times are EST *** NCAT 7382 74 56D IMag 4.0 ElDy 0 M2 698 U MAG HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE 150 10.0 8835 58 136 8 54 10 46.6 17.7 9254 151 10.0 8718 58 137 8 55 10 48.1 16.9 9154 152 10.0 8600 57 137 8 56 10 49.5 16.2 9054 153 9.9 8362 55 138 8 58 10 52.6 14.6 8853 154 9.9 8120 54 139 9 0 10 55.7 12.9 8653 There are about 550 objects in Allen Thomson's latest file that have eccentric orbits and a mean motion between 2 and 4. This particular one is interesting because it recently dipped very low into the Earth's atmosphere. However, the lunar and solar gravitational perturbations that caused this reversed in sign and decreased the eccentricity, so the drag is ten times smaller and it will be quite a few more years before it reenters. October drag .000500: 1 07382U 74056 D 94251.30760600 .00049687 -15925-6 25513-3 0 796 2 07382 62.1874 32.9751 7524804 278.9061 10.6420 2.03261401 29249 January drag .006500: 1 07382U 74056 D 95019.24263989 .00655499 30443-4 74867-3 0 2656 2 07382 62.3995 7.4804 7167890 281.3808 11.6707 2.49924464 32086 February drag .004400 and decreasing: 1 07382U 74056 D 95031.01445116 .00435950 32301-4 53056-3 0 2884 2 07382 62.4051 4.7274 7092030 281.6074 12.6539 2.59886133 32380 March drag .000900 and decreasing: 1 07382U 74056 D 95067.84634899 .00091661 20331-4 89569-4 0 3553 2 07382 62.4487 355.6533 6986938 282.3177 13.2237 2.74297239 33371 1 07382U 74056 D 95110.74000406 .00049545 44900-6 78237-4 0 4108 2 07382 62.4786 344.6628 6940411 283.2803 13.1669 2.80008178 34567 MikeReceived on Fri Apr 28 1995 - 16:57:54 UTC
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