The payloads' recent manoeuvres have separated their planes by the approximately 0.2 deg typical of 2nd, and now 3rd generation NOSS. They have manoeuvred toward their final orbits far more quickly, accomplishing in three weeks what took the 2001 duo several months. They were 64.4 s apart, separating at about 0.7 s per day. My guess is that they are cruising slowly to a pre-determined location in their plane, at which point they will manoeuvre to reduce their time separation to about 6 s, and match the approx 13.4044 rev/d mean motion of other operational NOSS. Observation arc 2003 Dec 17.78 - 22.71 UTC: NOSS 3-2 (A) 0.0 0.0 0.0 4.9 v 1 28095U 03054A 03356.68396494 .00000058 00000-0 10000-3 0 02 2 28095 63.4406 252.0404 0128618 180.2675 179.8302 13.40610679 08 WRMS residuals = 0.015 deg Observation arc 2003 Dec 17.70 - 22.03 UTC: NOSS 3-2 r 10.1 3.0 0.0 3.7 v 1 28096U 03054B 03356.00882205 .00000058 00000-0 10000-3 0 09 2 28096 63.6742 253.7568 0140492 182.3705 177.6673 13.40531468 09 WRMS residuals = 0.012 deg Observation arc 2003 Dec 17.78 - 22.71 UTC: NOSS 3-2 (C) 0.0 0.0 0.0 4.9 v 1 28097U 03054C 03356.68471103 .00000058 00000-0 10000-3 0 05 2 28097 63.4352 252.2369 0127344 180.3526 179.7429 13.40600461 00 WRMS residuals = 0.013 deg Ted Molczan ----------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from SeeSat-L, send a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@satobs.org List archived at http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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