Actually, after my posting someone from Spaceflight Now contacted me about this. I cannot recall which satellite is was other than it was one of the Yaogan reconnaissance payloads, around 18-24 months ago. The satellite was launched to a retrograde orbit which clearly - from the altitude - wasn't Sun-synchronous. But Spaceflight Now reported it as being a Sun-synchronous launch. I contacted Spaceflight Now about the error and reply that I got was the one I previously quoted. I couldn't be bothered to argue with them. Phillip Clark ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Jones" <clj@panix.com> To: <seesat-l@satobs.org> Sent: Sunday, April 08, 2012 6:07 PM Subject: Re: North Korea satellite: NOTAMs inconsistent withclaimedsun-synchronous orbit > On Sun, 8 Apr 2012 09:01:57 +0100 "Phillip Clark" > <phillipclark@btinternet.com> wrote: > >> You may wish to consider that many people consider any retrograde orbit >> is >> Sun-synchronous. I know that this is the policy of Spaceflight Now, the >> online news site. > > Wow, really? Do they consider the latest NROL satellite (inclination > around > 123 degrees) sun-synchronous? How about the Ofeq satellites (inclinations > around 143 degrees)? > > I can see being sloppy with satellites with inclinations closer to polar > (though I still think it's uncalled for, when all you have to do to be > correct > is to say "near polar" or "near sun-synchronous"), but in the case of > the other examples I mention, it's past being sloppy and into being wrong. > _______________________________________________ > Seesat-l mailing list > http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/listinfo/seesat-l > _______________________________________________ Seesat-l mailing list http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/listinfo/seesat-l
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