On Wed, 12 May 1999, B Magnus B{ckstr|m wrote: > Cosmos 2344! It is in a 1490 x 2750 km orbit inclined at 63.4 degrees. > It is rumored to be a large (c. 20 ton) optical recon satellite. > Dim, but usually one-power visible at ranges of about 2400 km (which is > what I get on high passes at my latitude) -- a beautiful slow wanderer. Actually, the mass of ~20 tonnes is a piece of total garbage, published in Aviation Week at the time of the launch. The LEO payload capability of the Proton-K as ~20 tonnes and Av Week0 assumed that the four-stage vehicle could put the same mass into the high orbit quoted above ! The satellite is a cylinder, diameter ~2.3 metres, length ~9 metres. Using the launch vehicle's capability to this orbit the mass might be up to 7 tonnes, but since it is based upon the Lonomosov satellite which had a launch mass of ~5.9 tonnes I think that ~6 tonnes is a more realistic figure. Pity no-one at Av Week bothered to sit down and do a few basic calculations before rushing into print with a really bad mass estimate ! Phillip Clark --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Phillip S Clark 25 Redfern Avenue Molniya Space Consultancy Whitton Compiler/Publisher, Worldwide Satellite Launches Middx TW4 5NA U.K. Specialist in "space archeology" - the older and more obscure the more interesting it is ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------