Henry Spencer wrote:
On Sat, 1 Feb 2003, Pierce Nichols wrote:If they were at 200,000 feet, wouldn't that be at the tail of the blackout period, or shortly afterwards?
There is no blackout period for the shuttle. Thanks to having relay
satellites looking down from above, communications are continuous throughout reentry.
Henry Spencer
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
I watched the reentry from Mojave, CA at about 0553 this morning. Although there was some light haze (clearly visible when viewing Venus and Jupiter with 10x50 binoculars while waiting for the event), I was able to see an orange dot leaving a glowing trail behind it. At about the time of closest approach (about 220 miles, I believe) the brightness flared for an instant and a small speck came away from the main body, drifting backwards relative to it. Over about ten seconds, it dimmed and went out, then perhaps thirty seconds later the shuttle flared again but no debris was visible. It appeared intact until I lost in the dawn glow a minute later.
This may have been the first direct element in the chain of events. The temetry and voice recordings will, with luck, tell a more complete tale.
It's a grim test case, but this is another data point for Ec calculations. Damn.
Doug Jones
_______________________________________________
ERPS-list mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://lists.erps.org/mailman/listinfo/erps-list
