RE: Optical 30 January 2014

From: Ted Molczan <ssl3molcz_at_rogers.com>
Date: Sun, 2 Feb 2014 00:31:01 -0500
Greg Roberts wrote:

> (2) USA 129 NOT seen on two good passes - possibly been de-orbited ????

I now suspect it was re-boosted hours before you last observed it, on Jan 27 UTC.

Here are search elements based on manoeuvres at perigee, near the beginning, middle and end of the most likely span
during which the re-boost would have occurred. A synthetic observation was generated at manoeuvre perigee and combined
with your observations. Epochs are ascending node prior to your observations.

Manoeuvre at 08:20:33 UTC                                307 X 751 km
1 70001U          14027.77765526  .00015514  00000-0  24929-3 0    05
2 70001  97.5637  83.3493 0321300 181.9039 178.0996 15.11478138    06

Manoeuvre at 13:06:01 UTC                                307 X 759 km
1 70002U          14027.77762216  .00015355  00000-0  24929-3 0    02
2 70002  97.5847  83.3491 0327076 181.9040 178.0972 15.10126892    06

Manoeuvre at 17:51:29 UTC                                307 X 814 km
1 70003U          14027.77739930  .00014397  00000-0  24929-3 0    05
2 70003  97.7244  83.3468 0365735 181.9048 178.0810 15.01092252    09

If it remains in orbit, then 70001 and 70002 probably are closest. It might be useful to check the above against the
time span during which you watched for the object on Jan 30 UTC. Any TLE that yields a prediction within the span, can
be excluded, since it should have been seen.

Ted Molczan


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Received on Sun Feb 02 2014 - 05:32:26 UTC

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