>He is trying to find infor for a satellite listed in the >"tle's" as 90012U. He said he believed it was an >UnClassified bird and was curious about exactly what it >was as it was in the TLE's with no name. This object is one of two fairings from the Japanese launch of MDS 1 (27367 02-003A). It flashes with a period of just over 8 seconds, and the flashes have been seen at magnitude +6 at a range of over 30,000 km. (An identical object with a slightly different flash period was observed in the same FOV one night by Mike McCants -- and I got to see them both there also.) Here are three recent elsets, from OIG, of objects that SpaceCom has cataloged from that launch: MDS 1 1 27367U 02003A 02257.94839607 .00001533 00000-0 23716-2 0 1425 2 27367 28.4024 131.1720 7241465 306.9532 6.6505 2.27379389 5062 DASH 1 27368U 02003B 02257.63140318 .00001694 00000-0 22602-2 0 1382 2 27368 28.4252 130.9982 7246786 307.1058 6.6662 2.27332679 5054 VEP 3/H-2A 1 27369U 02003C 02258.58996726 .00003003 00000-0 44844-2 0 1399 2 27369 28.4115 130.4340 7237618 308.0024 6.6017 2.28065952 5088 (For some reason, those three are not in the all0208.zip file of all cataloged objects for August 2002. Actually, there is a gap in that file from 27367 through 27383, inclusive.) To my knowledge, Don Gardner was the first amateur to see the one now standing as "90012". Here are some SeeSat-L messages discussing the various parts of the 02-003 launch: http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2002/0026.html http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2002/0027.html http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2002/0028.html http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2002/0033.html There should be at least five objects cataloged from that launch, the three above plus the two fairing halves. There was also a payload adapter, but I'm not sure if DASH separated from it. If they did separate, that would be six objects. I'm pretty sure that VEP 3 was supposed to stay joined to the H-2A upper stage. As to why SpaceCom has cataloged only three objects -- only they know. I think I've heard that sometimes they may have had problems tracking objects in geosynchronous transfer orbits. Ed Cannon - ecannon@mail.utexas.edu - Austin, Texas, USA ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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