Allen Thomson wrote: > Doubtlessly most of you have seen this already, but if not... > > http://spacex.com/index.html?section=updates&content=http%3A//spacex.com/updates .php > > [June 24: We were just informed that the Titan IV flight will launch no > earlier than September and may very well be delayed until October or > November, depending upon what issues arise (due to overflight concerns,... This is pure speculation, but I wonder whether this could be the "8X" that was much talked about in the late 1990's, but has yet to put in appearance. If so, then I like your long-ago speculation about a highly elliptical, sun-synchronous, retrograde critical inclination orbit: http://www.fas.org/spp/military/program/imint/eist-iv.htm Something around 116.6 deg, 630 X 7600 km would do the job nicely. It would make 8 rev/d, and its apogee would be about 8 times that of a standard KeyHole orbit. Could either characteristic have been the origin of the "8X" moniker? Ted Molczan ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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