Spy satellite sleuths are likely to find this article of great interest: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/030811/usnews/11nro.htm Most notable for observers is confirmation of suspicions held by some of us, of problems with the NOSS payload launched on 2001 Sep 08: 01040A and C (SSN 26905/26907), and the KeyHole launched on 2001 Oct 05: 01044A / 26934. Only two of the expected three NOSS were deployed, leading to speculation that the third failed to separate from the Centaur stage. The KeyHole entered the standard roughly 260 x 1010 km orbit, but after three months manoeuvred to a more circular 410 x 860 km orbit, and has manoeuvred only once since. The higher perigee reduces drag, greatly reducing the need for reboost manoeuvres. Not long ago, I heard a rumour that the spacecraft had major problems and was not yet operational. My suspicion had been that the low-drag orbit was intended to conserve propellant as a hedge against delays in the FIA (Future Imaging Architecture) program, but U.S. News reports that the spacecraft has problems. Ted Molczan ----------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from SeeSat-L, send a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@satobs.org List archived at http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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