Anomalies in spacecraft velocities Options

[As old as Voyage...]

Very interesting story on SPACE.com regarding currently unexplained anomalies in the velocities of spacecraft after their Earth flybys.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/0802...ft-anomaly.html

Perhaps the twisting of spacetime induced by Earth's rotation could be gently altering the spacecraft's velocity.

http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/200...FTOKEN=51791561

In any case its pretty cool to have an unexplained force meddling with our best laid plans.

[remcook]

"The researchers looked at six deep-space probes — Galileo I and II to Jupiter[...]" Two flybys perhaps...

[Greg Hullender]

"The researchers looked at six deep-space probes — Galileo I and II to Jupiter[...]" Two flybys perhaps...

Yes, Galileo was a VEEGA, so it had two different Earth flybys. They're looking at anomolies in probes that did Earth gravitational assists. Talking about anomolies around 13 mm/s when the expected error was only 0.1 mm/sec.

Messenger was the only one where they didn't see anything. They're suggesting maybe because it was the most symmetrical of the group, but who knows. It was also the only one trying to lose, not gain, velocity.

I'm with nprev, though; highly unlikely this is new physics. More likely it's some factor no one thought to include because it was thought to be "too small to measure." Maybe something involving light pressure on the probe -- complicated by the way the probe is colored. Who knows? Be interesting to see what they finid though.

--Greg