LCROSS en route |
LCROSS en route |
Jul 15 2009, 03:08 PM
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 87 Joined: 9-November 07 Member No.: 3958 |
While we're waiting for Those Pictures, here are a couple of shots of LCROSS from our campus observatory last night (0221, 027 UT on 15 July). 4 minute exposures tracking expected motion from the Horizons ephemeris, within 20 degrees of the southern horizon and fighting summertime haze as well as city lights. I wanted to catch it before its inclined orbit takes it too far south, after which it spends a week or so as a predawn object. The range was about 563,000 km, and the Centaur is no bigger than a CSM/LM combination, so this is a more difficult target than spotting an Apollo enroute was. (On the other hand, nobody had CCD imagers in 1969).
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Oct 6 2009, 01:42 AM
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#2
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Newbie Group: Members Posts: 16 Joined: 30-March 08 Member No.: 4078 |
They don't have a lot of choice as there aren't a lot of good target craters with an adequate concentration of water and the ones with water don't necessarily have the best geometry. I'm not saying they haven't made the best decision possible, just that it doesn't look like an easy trade-off.
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