[X] My Assistant

[NGC3314]

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).

[Phil Stooke]

From the Observation Group website:

-------------------------
Hello Team!

Latest update on impact locations:
Centaur: -84.70, 310.95E
SSC: -84.77, 310.45E
These are final and should not change.


Nominal timing for impacts:
Centaur = 9 Oct 2009 11:31:30 UTC
SSC = 9 Oct 2009 11:35:45 UTC
There may be some variation from these nominal times through remaining
trajectory correction maneuvering. We will post updates to these times
as they become available. Any timing updates on impact night will be
posted to LCROSS Twitter page, LCROSS Facebook page, and LCROSS-CS.


Brian
----------------------
Final LCROSS Centaur and SSC target coordinates (Lat., Lon. in ME)
Centaur: -84.675, 311.275 E
SSC: -84.729, 310.64 E


Elevations (Assumed Lunar radius: 1737.4 km):
Centaur target elev: -3.82693 km
SSC target elev: -3.80909 km

Impact Times:
Centaur: 9 Oct 2009 11:31:30 UTC
SSC: 9 Oct 2009 11:35:45 UTC

Note: These are nominal impact positions and times. Actual impact
times based on TCM results may differ (see next slide for
uncertainties)
----------------------------
That point is slightly west of the position shown on my map.

Phil

[dmuller]

Nominal timing for impacts:
Centaur = 9 Oct 2009 11:31:30 UTC
SSC = 9 Oct 2009 11:35:45 UTC

Thanks Phil, this is very useful. Updated my realtime simulations with that info. Having troubles finding anything of a timeline of upcoming events, or the very latest trajectory info for that matter - the data on the Horizons system has LCROSS going through the moon and I could not find any SPICE kernels. Unfortunately I'll be on the road for most of next week and can only "tweak" my existing trajectory data to match predicted impact times, can't process SPICE kernels on the road.