Art Glick wrote: > These triangles are my favorite observation, but I recall > that the 'B' object of this set had been lost. Then I > noticed that Ed was referring to an 'E' object, and thanks > to his excellent reporting I was able to check this on H-A, > which identifies Ed's 'E' object instead as "Titan 45K-4 Stage > 2". I presume this to be part of a launch vehicle. Heavens Above correctly identifies the E object as the Titan IV 2nd stage. Unfortunately, we hobbyists chose to use that designation for one of the NOSS payloads. Russell Eberst discovered the 2nd stage, flashing brightly about once per second, on 1990 Jun 18 UTC, 10 days after its launch from Cape Canaveral. He reported 19 positional observations through Jun 25, days before it decayed. Here are the latest elements derived from Russell's observations, using USSTRATCOM's designation: NOSS 2-1 r 1 20642U 90050E 90175.99866977 .01504882 00000-0 54060-3 0 00 2 20642 60.9935 172.0550 0006280 278.9389 81.1038 16.24342066 05 Arc 1990 Jun 23.97 - 25.02, WRMS residuals = 0.034 deg Russell had discovered the payload two days prior to the rocket. It too was in a 61 deg orbit, but about 454 km high. Naturally, we called the payload 90050A and the rocket 90050B. So we were surprised when the 1990 Jun 30 Satellite Situation Report listed only an A and E object - and with consecutive catalogue numbers: 1990 050A 20641 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available 1990 050E 20642 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available I suspected E was a typo. Had to be! But, then the 1990 Sep 30 Satellite Situation Report listed the following: 1990 050A 20641 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available 1990 050B 20682 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available 1990 050C 20691 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available 1990 050D 20692 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available 1990 050E 20642 US 8 Jun Elements Not Available No object received a USA number, so the satellite situation was rather confusing. It never would have occurred to me that this could have been a NOSS launch. After all, the NOSS we knew were small, and launched on Atlas rockets from VAFB. Perhaps some of the more experienced observers guessed right; I do not recall. On 1990 Oct 09 at 18:55 UTC, Russell Eberst was looking for fragments of the recently exploded Chinese rocket stage, 1990-081D, when he spotted a NOSS triad. They were 6th magnitude, notably brighter than their usual 8th magnitude, but NOSS were known to brighten to 2nd magnitude, so well within the observed range. Russell observed them one rev later, and obtained positions, which turned out to be close in time and track with the 1987-043 NOSS triad, so he identified them as such. He observed them again on Oct 12, again brighter than usual, but he continued to believe them to be the 87043 triad. But when he spotted them again on Nov 2, still brighter than usual, he became suspicious that they were larger than other NOSS - perhaps payloads of the mysterious Titan IV launch of June 8. If so, then the real 87043 triad must not have been far away. The next night, he conducted a planar search. The new triad arrived on time, and the 87043 triad followed, just three minutes later. The observers decided to designate the new objects 90050C, D and E. I argued for B, C, and D, but the original decision stood. If I recall correctly, Mike McCants called them B, C and D until 1998, when he adopted the consensus designations. Certainly, the convention is to assign payloads first, followed by rocket bodies, then debris, so USSTRATCOM had been correct in designating the 1990-050 rocket E. But they designated the rocket body of the 1991-076 NOSS launch, as B, and its triad as C, D and E. The 1996-029 launch also was confusing for a time. Most bizarre have been the 01040 and 03054 launches, of which, only one of the two payloads have been acknowledged as such; the other apparently reported as debris. Ted Molczan ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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