Decay watch: 2000 May 19

From: Alan Pickup (alan@wingar.demon.co.uk)
Date: Fri May 19 2000 - 13:58:59 PDT

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    In the vain hope that further elsets would appear for either of the
    current decayers, I delayed updating my Decay Watch page at 
                http://www.wingar.demon.co.uk/satevo/dkwatch/
    until now.
    
    
    #20338 = 89- 94 A = Molniya 3-36
    
    Latest decay analyses:
            SpaceCom: May 19 20:15 +-1h        61.1 S    99.1 E
            SatEvo  : May 19 20:03 +-10m       53.8 S    29.7 E
    The latest, and possibly final, elset...
    Molniya 3-36                                     762 x 77 km
    1 20338U 89094A   00140.74815059  .99999999  43892-5  10908-2 0  8958
    2 20338  63.3731 345.5200 0503867 252.8608 213.1109 15.49121741 77859
    ...shows it 4.2 minutes early against the prediction I posted yesterday,
    though this is after 23.2 hours during which time the orbital period had
    fallen from 118.4 to 93.0 minutes. However, the residual is uncertain
    because I'm certain that the published ndot2 term (0.99999999) is very
    much an understatement of the true value, which may be closer to 3. The
    stress at perigee on that orbit will be sufficiently high that it might
    have broken up and decayed then, perhaps at 18:40 UTC +-10m near 63.2 S,
    88.5 E. This would be over the Southern Ocean, far to the south of
    India. Otherwise I show it surviving into a further orbit with decay
    near the next perigee as given above, to the south of South Africa.
    A possible elset for this final rev is:
    Molniya 3-36                                     547 x 76 km
    1 20338U 89094A   00140.79244404 4.59359892  16797+2  16075-2 0 98955
    2 20338  63.3578 345.3566 0352035 252.8618 103.2537 15.86798289 77864
             _________________________________________
    
    #22726 = 93- 48 D = InSat 2B Spelda
    
    Latest predictions:
            SpaceCom: May 20 12:42 +-21h        5.8 N    44.2 W
            SatEvo  : May 20 17:14 +-10h        7.0 N    90.0 W
    Fresh elsets for this are long overdue. The latest is:
    InSat 2B Splda                                   828 x 142 km
    1 22726U 93048D   00140.03685185  .16616626 -27858-4  26722-2 0  8780
    2 22726   7.0907 341.5261 0499153   1.8772 275.4323 15.26930137 99272
    
    
    Alan
    -- 
     Alan Pickup | COSPAR 2707:  55d53m48.7s N  3d11m51.2s W   156m asl
     Edinburgh   | Tel: +44 (0)131 477 9144     Fax: +44 (0)870 0520750
     Scotland    | SatEvo page:   http://www.wingar.demon.co.uk/satevo/
    
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