RE: USA was unstable , rolling and tumbling !

From: Ted Molczan (ssl3molcz@rogers.com)
Date: Sun Mar 30 2008 - 12:33:34 UTC

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    John Locker wrote:
    
    > I saw it a number of occassions at quite high mag , and also 
    > through the veiwfinder and I saw no evidence of flashing , 
    > although it was on one of those obs brighter than expected.
    > 
    > If you look at the image captured by Paul a few days before 
    > destruction , there's no eveidence there of anything tumbling 
    > wildly as the statement from Hicks seems to suggest.Indeed it 
    > was seen by a number of list members in those  last few days 
    > and I dont recall anyone suggesting it was tumbling. 
    > And yet the Hicks statement would give the impression that 
    > for the six weeks prior  to intercept , the thing was going haywire !
    
    I find that quote (below) insufficient to support the inference that Admiral
    Hicks meant it was tumbling wildly or going haywire; he was talking about
    stability on a time scale of at least one revolution, so he could have meant
    that it was rotating slowly:
    
    http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=aerospacedaily&
    id=news/ASAT032408.xml
    
    <<< "[The dead satellite] was not stable," Hicks says. "It was rolling and
    tumbling and [its gyration] wasn't always the same from one orbit to another,
    which added to the technical challenge. We tried for six weeks to see what was
    predictable about what it was doing each orbit, and we just couldn't do it." >>>
    
    Although the object was generally observed to be steady in brightness, irregular
    variations were reported on a handful of occasions; however, those effects could
    have been due to changing illumination as it moved relative the observer.
    
    0605701201807012417453953  01   12154540  +55132   1  5             +4 +5      I
    0605701267507030805264480  010  12134255  +82437   20 5             +1 +2      I
    0605701256307072921534325  01   12034870  +630288  30 4             +1 +4      I
    0605701201808021818550344  01   12043408  -28284   1  5             -1 +3      I
    
    UK format: http://www.satobs.org/position/UKformat.html
    
    29651 06 057A   4353 P 20080105164846400 17 75 2239271+677540 56 I+020 10
    29651 06 057A   4353 P 20080105164858100 17 75 0041137+613880 56 I+015 10
    
    IOD format: http://www.satobs.org/position/IODformat.html
    
    Ted Molczan
    
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