Granat
Ed Cannon (ecannon@mail.utexas.edu)
Mon, 17 May 1999 22:27:05 -0500
Too late I developed a hope of seeing Granat before its impending
demise (predicted for June 3 in Alan Pickup's Decay List #77).
It appears that from now on the best chances to see it are from
the southern hemisphere.
For June 3, using the GSOC geographical database (I hope that's
okay, Chris!), the elset below, and Highfly I found that there's
a predicted pass that at about 2:50 UTC enters Earth's shadow
very near the zenith, several thousand kilometers above the
surface, somewhere not too far northeast of Comodoro Rivadavia,
Argentina. Latlong shows a northbound track over southern Chile
and Argentina, with it going over the Atlantic near the shadow-
entry point and reaching a perigee of less than 800 km somewhere
near lat. 16 north, long. 3 west, at about 3:18 UTC on June 3.
So if it does re-enter on June 3, these two programs seem at
least to suggest that it will be over the Atlantic Ocean.
Granat 202854 x 756 km
1 20352U 89096A 99134.12222190 .00000000 00000-0 00000-0 0 9135
2 20352 49.7900 284.1190 9340471 21.5370 41.7460 0.24401489 11213
OIG has its RCS as 0.14, but the Encyclopedia Astronautica has
its mass as 3,200 kg. There seems to be a discrepancy between
those values.
Ed Cannon - ecannon@mail.utexas.edu - Austin, Texas, USA