At 22:34 08/07/04 +1200, you wrote: >AURA is due to be launched from Vandenberg on July 11 between 10:01:57 and >10:04:57 UTC. Launch vehicle is a Delta 2 rocket. (Note: some sources give >July 10 launch but it seems that is has been postponed for a day "for >records check." Source- Spaceflight Now.) NASA-TV is showing it scheduled >for 11 July. > >Its orbit is described as "438 mi (705 km) polar, sun-synchronous, 1:45 PM >ascending node" and "near polar, sun-synchronous orbit with a period of >approximately 100 minutes." > >Presumably from this information it should be possible to calculate launch >track and provisional TLEs? (I cannot find a launch track on any of the >relevant websites.) Using the following website: http://aura.gsfc.nasa.gov/mission/formation_flying.html we find that Aura follows Aqua by "a nominal 15 minutes". This corresponds to about 54 degrees in mean anomaly. So if we take a recent tle for Aqua: Aqua 8.0 4.0 2.5 4.0 d 18 703 x 702 km 1 27424U 02022A 04189.39469568 .00000094 00000-0 30835-4 0 7722 2 27424 98.2218 129.0365 0001165 83.9975 276.1352 14.57108827115793 and deduct 54 degrees from the mean anomaly (276.1352), we get Aura 8.0 4.0 2.5 4.0 d 18 703 x 702 km 1 88888U 04000A 04189.39469568 .00000094 00000-0 30835-4 0 7722 2 88888 98.2218 129.0365 0001165 83.9975 222.1352 14.57108827115793 Remember that "15 minutes" is a nominal figure, so a margin of 5-10 minutes should be allowed for this provisional TLE. Best wishes, Russell Eberst 55.9486N, 3.1383W, 150 feet = 46 metres above MSL ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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