I saw neither object last night (2009 May 08 UTC). Conditions were poor - haze, illuminated by bright moonlight - still I was surprised not to see the payload at 04:18:30 UTC, at a location where it should have been around mag 6 - 7, and I could easily see to mag 9 with 25x100 binoculars. Fortunately, Alberto Rango observed it hours earlier. I offer two solutions: STSS-ATRR 864 X 876 km 1 34903U 09023A 09127.88489887 .00000000 00000-0 00000-0 0 05 2 34903 98.9298 226.1078 0008205 251.8764 108.1511 14.06068508 05 Arc 20090505.9-0507.89 WRMS resid 0.057 totl 0.011 xtrk Removing two points from the above solution that had unusually high time residuals, improved the total residuals: STSS-ATRR 857 X 883 km 1 34903U 09023A 09127.88491610 .00000000 00000-0 00000-0 0 02 2 34903 98.8845 226.0325 0018182 301.1228 58.8157 14.06068785 09 Arc 20090505.91-0507.89 WRMS resid 0.014 totl 0.009 xtrk The second solution, if correct, raises the possibility of future manoeuvres to further circularize the orbit. As for the 2nd stage, it did not appear for Alberto on two passes, using my 71950 search elements (below). Pierre Neirinck made a fairly wide search at high elevation, and also did not see it. 1 71950U 09125.95957157 .00247275 00000-0 30000-3 0 03 2 71950 112.7800 216.3633 0519924 282.5289 71.8193 15.08518086 04 In view of the expected low perigee height, I offer this alternative, with ten times greater rate of decay: 1 71951U 09125.95957158 .02472750 00000-0 30000-2 0 04 2 71951 112.7800 216.3633 0519924 282.5289 71.8193 15.08518086 05 Prediction time uncertainty tonight with 71951 would be around 10 min. Ted Molczan ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri May 08 2009 - 13:05:50 UTC