The fate of Fotons

Alan Pickup (alan@wingar.demon.co.uk)
Mon, 27 Oct 1997 22:00:44 +0000

The decaying Foton N11 Soyuz-U rocket should decay on Halloween
according to my SatEvo analysis. The latest elset from OIG is:
Foton N11 Soyuz-U r                              258 x 187 km
1 25007U 97060B   97300.76111574  .01463264  84440-5  60530-3 0   581
2 25007  62.7882 167.3513 0053521 118.7255 241.9478 16.18915966  2896

A selection of SatEvo predicted elsets (using a fit to elsets since
97299.58):
Foton N11 Soyuz-U r                              254 x 186 km
1 25007U 97060B   97301.00809093  .01728863  13781-2  67899-3 0 90534
2 25007  62.7884 166.3536 0051138 118.4357 242.0803 16.19786337  2932
Foton N11 Soyuz-U r                              246 x 184 km
1 25007U 97060B   97301.50168913  .01941297  16335-2  67879-3 0 90532
2 25007  62.7878 164.3545 0047240 118.5352 241.9411 16.21594193  3011
Foton N11 Soyuz-U r                              237 x 181 km
1 25007U 97060B   97302.05628379  .02270953  24156-2  67801-3 0 90530
2 25007  62.7870 162.1016 0042435 118.6475 241.7799 16.23918506  3107
Foton N11 Soyuz-U r                              227 x 178 km
1 25007U 97060B   97302.54853539  .02716817  37992-2  67948-3 0 90530
2 25007  62.7862 160.0951 0037661 118.7476 241.6310 16.26356754  3180

Foton N11 itself appears to have come to the end of its mission and was
presumably recovered last Thursday - can anyone confirm this? The
latest/final elset was:
Foton N11                                        363 x 218 km
1 25006U 97060A   97296.29533513  .00057524  80024-5  87272-4 0   240
2 25006  62.8095 185.7734 0108643 110.5346 250.7413 15.94206120  2163

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