Updated elements

From: Ted Molczan (ssl3molcz@rogers.com)
Date: Tue Sep 18 2012 - 09:09:25 UTC

  • Next message: Russell Eberst: "2012SEP17-18.OBS"

    On 2012 Sep 17 UTC, Cees Bassa, Bram Dorreman, Russell Eberst, Kevin Fetter and Scott Tilley made new observations of
    objects from the NROL-36 NOSS launch. I reduced the following data from Kevin's video:
    
    79603 12 048P   1775 G 20120917091903486 36 25 0310688+193000 37 S+047 02
    79603 12 048P   1775 G 20120917091907223 36 25 0312868+202687 37 S+045 02
    38758 12 048A   1775 G 20120917091918867 36 25 0310187+193949 37 S+045 02
    38758 12 048A   1775 G 20120917091922104 36 25 0312160+202899 37 S+045 02
    
    I continue to assign "A" to the trailing payload, in the expectation that it will eventually become the leader, and in
    conformance with our traditional practice of assigning "A" to the leader. I believe that the orbits will evolve in the
    same manner as those of the NOSS 3-5 launch. Initially 11014A led 11014B. The differential in their orbital periods was
    about the same as that of NOSS 3-6. Nineteen days after launch, 11014B manoeuvred to increase its mean motion. At the
    time, it trailed 11014A by about 1 min, but the change of mean motion enabled it to quickly overtake it. Nearly 24 h
    later, 11014B led 11014A by ~7 s, at which time 11014A manoeuvred to synchronize its mean motion with 11014B. They have
    adjusted mean motion since then, but have always maintained the same relationship. For some reason, we did not swap A
    and B, so B remains the leader. I cannot guarantee the same will happen with the 12048 pair, but I suspect it will,
    because of the similarity of their orbital period differential with that of the 11014 pair.
    
    NOSS 3-6 (A)                                           1013 X 1200 km
    1 38758U 12048A   12261.45317413  .00000000  00000-0  00000-0 0    09
    2 38758  63.4283  32.6869 0124892 180.5166 179.5749 13.40429195    06
    Arc 20120914.4-0917.46 WRMS resid 0.034 totl 0.013 xtrk
    
    NOSS 3-6 (P)                                           1010 X 1202 km
    1 79603U 12048P   12261.45299643  .00000000  00000-0  00000-0 0    07
    2 79603  63.4252  32.6787 0128027 179.1395 180.9874 13.40496461    02
    Arc 20120915.52-0917.46 WRMS resid 0.023 totl 0.009 xtrk
    
    NOSS 3-6 r                                               459 X 774 km
    1 38770U 12048N   12261.18580276  .00012203  00000-0  93524-3 0    06
    2 38770  64.6792  30.5366 0224780 294.0428  63.7303 14.83665156    03
    Arc 20120915.51-0917.2 WRMS resid 0.025 totl 0.013 xtrk
    
    Ted Molczan
    
    
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