LAMO, aka Low Altitude Mapping Orbit Options

[dilo]

I think is time to start this new topic, now that Dawn is more than half-way in the transition from HAMO to LAMO (as showed in the plot below).

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[Phil Stooke]

This link...

http://pds-smallbodies.astro.umd.edu/data_...ase_sched.shtml


... suggests a later date.

Phil

[dilo]

This link... suggests a later date.

...and suggests also a new Vesta departure date (shifted from July 2012 to Jan 2013), probably in order to study also North Pole region!

[SFJCody]

...and suggests also a new Vesta departure date (shifted from July 2012 to Jan 2013), probably in order to study also North Pole region!

I believe that's the PDS data release date, not the spacecraft event date.

[angel1801]

I did a Solar System Simulator run for Vesta and I worked out that equinox for Vesta will be on or about July 27, 2012.

You can work this out by choosing the "from above" viewpoint for Vesta and finding the date when the phase angle is 90 degrees. This is when the sun's terminator is exactly over the North Pole.

I got this idea from doing this for Mercury where the phase angle as viewed directly from either pole is always 90 degrees.