Decay watch: PAS 8 Proton r & Orbcomm Pegasus r

Alan Pickup (alan@wingar.demon.co.uk)
Thu, 5 Nov 1998 20:53:46 +0000

Against the predictions I posted here yesterday, the PAS 8 Proton rocket
object was running all of 3 minutes early at the epoch of the latest
elset:

PAS 8 Proton r                                   161 x 143 km
1 25523U 98065B   98309.73548376  .08874335  00000-0  20417-3 0   195
2 25523  51.6012 122.0038 0013111 269.7784  90.2433 16.45232663   256

My latest estimate is for decay at November 6.04 +-0.1d. New prediction:
PAS 8 Proton r                                   150 x 137 km
1 25523U 98065B   98309.85681636  .16135288  23362+0  21379-3 0 90193
2 25523  51.6003 121.3107 0010162 270.2968  89.5868 16.48556472   274
PAS 8 Proton r                                   143 x 132 km
1 25523U 98065B   98309.91739578  .21976152  48077+0  20502-3 0 90195
2 25523  51.5997 120.9633 0008305 270.5566  89.3482 16.50823459   283
PAS 8 Proton r                                   132 x 124 km
1 25523U 98065B   98309.97787567  .37207192  16665+1  21203-3 0 90198
2 25523  51.5988 120.6151 0005894 270.8170  89.1154 16.54217328   290

                    ---------------------

The Pegasus rocket that launched Orbcomm 21...28 is also nearing decay,
due at November 7.6 +-0.5d by my calculation.

The latest elset is...

Orbc21 Pegasus r 1.3  1.0  0.0  7.0 d            247 x 189 km
1 25483U 98053J   98309.70869053  .02531692  00000-0  95199-3 0  1114
2 25483  44.9593 336.0941 0044386  42.7740 317.7238 16.20608912  6915

...and my prediction:

Orbc21 Pegasus r 1.3  1.0  0.0  7.0 d            239 x 186 km
1 25483U 98053J   98310.01663416  .03441212  56297-2  11192-2 0 91114
2 25483  44.9588 334.1606 0040601  44.8282 315.4991 16.22677360  6967
Orbc21 Pegasus r 1.3  1.0  0.0  7.0 d            224 x 180 km
1 25483U 98053J   98310.50851274  .04646786  11510-1  11274-2 0 91112
2 25483  44.9578 331.0593 0033685  48.1232 312.1637 16.26586213  7044
Orbc21 Pegasus r 1.3  1.0  0.0  7.0 d            199 x 168 km
1 25483U 98053J   98311.06014047  .08348926  44136-1  11274-2 0 91112
2 25483  44.9560 327.5558 0023632  51.8457 308.3668 16.33311097  7132

This enters the Earth's shadow at about 18:00 local time near the
northbound equator crossing and leaves eclipse while southbound near 26
deg N at 05:30 local time.

Alan
-- 
 Alan Pickup | COSPAR 2707:   55d53m48.7s N   3d11m51.2s W   156m asl
 Edinburgh   | Home:   alan@wingar.demon.co.uk    +44 (0)131 477 9144
 Scotland    | SatEvo page:     http://www.wingar.demon.co.uk/satevo/