-
Atlantis heading home Friday - ISS may need to avoid Chinese debris
by
Chris Bergin
on 26 Jun, 2007 05:01
-
-
#1
by
Andrewwski
on 26 Jun, 2007 06:13
-
Is the possible debris confirmed? I know a few months ago there were unfounded rumors on this.
-
#2
by
ShuttleDiscovery
on 26 Jun, 2007 06:57
-
"..and 932 will be pathfinder"
What does that mean, that plane (932) will be escorting the SCA?
-
#3
by
sfxtd
on 26 Jun, 2007 07:36
-
ShuttleDiscovery - 25/6/2007 11:57 PM
"..and 932 will be pathfinder"
What does that mean, that plane (932) will be escorting the SCA?
I assume it means flying ahead of the SCA to warn of clear-air turbulence and such.
-
#4
by
eeergo
on 26 Jun, 2007 10:19
-
Andrewwski - 26/6/2007 8:13 AM Is the possible debris confirmed? I know a few months ago there were unfounded rumors on this.
I saw two or three months ago a UN report (which I assume it's not unfounded
) offering a prediction of the debris' trajectories. There was even a slide showing that in one year or so -I don't remember the figure- the debris would be spread over the whole globe.
So it's only a matter of time before these encounters happen. And I guess they'll be turning even more frequent (and with less avoidance distance than the current predicted 17 km) with the passing months. Lovely stupid military tests...
I can't find the actual link to that report, but I think it'd been posted by Philip (psloss)...
-
#5
by
Chris Bergin
on 26 Jun, 2007 16:27
-
Andrewwski - 26/6/2007 7:13 AM
Is the possible debris confirmed? I know a few months ago there were unfounded rumors on this.
The information is from an official NASA documented from last night. Not sure how that could be an unfounded rumor?
-
#6
by
Andrewwski
on 26 Jun, 2007 17:15
-
No, I wasn't referring to this one. I know that there were unfounded rumors a few months ago, and I was hoping to clarify that this was not a rebirth of the old ones.
Not that I should worry - I know everything you put on this site is credible. Another reason why I love it so much.
-
#7
by
Chris Bergin
on 26 Jun, 2007 17:37
-
Ah ok. Thanks

Speaking of which (on this debris event), we're waiting to hear if the ISS was required to make a DAM.
*Paging Jim Oberg*
-
#8
by
avitek
on 26 Jun, 2007 18:31
-
Computer program SOCRATES at the Celestrack site gives for TLEs for 2007-06-26 01:00 UTC those parameters for close encounter between ISS and FY-1C debris:
Action |
NORAD Catalog Number |
Name |
Days Since Epoch |
Max Probability |
Dilution Threshold (km) |
Min Range (km) |
Relative Velocity (km/sec) |
|---|
Start (UTC) |
TCA (UTC) |
Stop (UTC) |
|---|
| |
25544 |
ISS (ZARYA) |
0.987 |
4.985E-06 |
2.992 |
4.231 |
14.465 |
| 29719 |
FENGYUN 1C DEB |
1.189 |
2007 Jun 26 20:26:51.647 |
2007 Jun 26 20:26:51.831 |
2007 Jun 26 20:26:52.015 |
-
#9
by
STS Tony
on 26 Jun, 2007 20:33
-
avitek - 26/6/2007 1:31 PM
Computer program SOCRATES at the Celestrack site gives for TLEs for 2007-06-26 01:00 UTC those parameters for close encounter between ISS and FY-1C debris:
What exactly does that all mean? Can you translate it?
-
#10
by
Almurray1958
on 26 Jun, 2007 20:46
-
-
#11
by
Jorge
on 26 Jun, 2007 20:54
-
STS Tony - 26/6/2007 3:33 PM
avitek - 26/6/2007 1:31 PM
Computer program SOCRATES at the Celestrack site gives for TLEs for 2007-06-26 01:00 UTC those parameters for close encounter between ISS and FY-1C debris:
What exactly does that all mean? Can you translate it?
TLE - Two Line Elements. A format used by NORAD to describe the orbit of a spacecraft.
Celestrak - (
http://celestrak.com/). A website run by Dr. T. S. Kelso that publishes TLEs from NORAD's Satellite Catalog (SATCAT).
SOCRATES - (
http://celestrak.com/SOCRATES/). Satellite Orbital Conjunction Reports Assessing Threatening Encounters in Space. A service that computes conjunctions (close encounters/potential collisions) between payloads and all objects in the SATCAT.
UTC - Universal Time Coordinated. Roughly equivalent to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Standard timetag for TLEs.
ISS - International Space Station. Self-explanatory.
FY-1C - Fengyun 1C. A defunct Chinese satellite that was used as a target for a recent Chinese ASAT test, which produced a lot of debris in low Earth orbit.
-
#12
by
Chris Bergin
on 26 Jun, 2007 23:48
-
ISS did not conduct a DAM, after further predictions conducted by US and Russian Ballistics that were conducted today.
-
#13
by
Launch Fan
on 27 Jun, 2007 02:47
-
Chris Bergin - 26/6/2007 6:48 PM
ISS did not conduct a DAM, after further predictions conducted by US and Russian Ballistics that were conducted today.
Still leaves the question on how much notice they get for these possible collision avoidance moves?
-
#14
by
Jorge
on 27 Jun, 2007 03:29
-
Launch Fan - 26/6/2007 9:47 PM
Chris Bergin - 26/6/2007 6:48 PM
ISS did not conduct a DAM, after further predictions conducted by US and Russian Ballistics that were conducted today.
Still leaves the question on how much notice they get for these possible collision avoidance moves?
At least 36 hours for the shuttle. For ISS, at least that long, if not longer.
-
#15
by
avitek
on 27 Jun, 2007 06:50
-
Jorge - 27/6/2007 5:29 AM
Launch Fan - 26/6/2007 9:47 PM
Chris Bergin - 26/6/2007 6:48 PM
ISS did not conduct a DAM, after further predictions conducted by US and Russian Ballistics that were conducted today.
Still leaves the question on how much notice they get for these possible collision avoidance moves?
At least 36 hours for the shuttle. For ISS, at least that long, if not longer.
According to the very informative article in April 2001 issue of Orbital Debris Quarterly News, see
http://www.orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/newsletter/pdfs/ODQNv6i2.pdfon page 4, at least 72 hours before TCA. There is in the mentioned article the whole collision avoidance procedure described in detail.
-
#16
by
Chris Bergin
on 27 Jun, 2007 14:32
-
Atlantis might be back in one day now. Working on NASA information on L2. Will do an article.