The page regarding Iridium to which Geoff Chester drew our attention has been updated somewhat as of March 14: http://www.motorola.com/satellite/info/ Also, thanks to "Jeff" (Hunt?) who posted the following on the newsgroup. It's some information on a United Nations site (Office of Outer Space Affairs) regarding, in the context of "Steps Taken By Space Agencies For Reducing The Growth Or Damage Potential Of Space Debris", what types of plans were made for Iridium satellites: http://www.un.or.at/OOSA/spdeb/spdeb95/spdeba.html#II "A large company in the United States that is responsible for development of the Iridium constellation of 66 small communications satellites has included provisions for debris mitigation in the very first phases of its programme. In the original operations concept, the most important provision was the de-orbiting of spent spacecraft. ... "The procedures for the operational phase of the Iridium project include supporting software that will direct (under specific conditions) the spacecraft to execute fuel-depleting and perigee-lowering burns with whatever capability it can use. The procedures emphasize the need for ailing spacecraft to be taken out of the operational orbit and "safed" with regard to explosion hazard. The operator of the Iridium system has agreed to the de-orbiting philosophy, which can occasionally result in de-orbiting perfectly healthy spacecraft because the fuel remaining is only enough for de-orbiting." 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://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Mar 14 2000 - 23:07:34 PST