re: Double flare of Mir

Philip Chien (kc4yer@amsat.org)
Sun, 7 Jun 1998 18:54:59 -0400

Johannes Mueller <Joh.Mueller@rz-online.de>

>On 30 May 1998 we observed from two locations, separated by 463 km,
>what we believe to be a double flare of Mir. It occurred shortly
>before Mir reached culmination in the northern sky.

It's likely that the reason you saw these flares was due to the failure of
the Omega sensor on the Mir Motion Control Computer.  Once the Omega failed
Mir went in to a very very very slow tumble.  The crew was able to get it
under control fairly easily, and the backup ORT sensor is in use.

Obviously most of the time Mir's solar arrays follow the sun so there's
little likelyhood of any flares.  The exception is the damaged Spektr array
which is fixed in position (relative to Spektr and the rest of Mir) and not
generating power.

While the tumble was very slow I can easily see geometries where multiple
flares could occur.



Philip Chien, KC4YER
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