suitsat launched today (well yesterday)

suitsat launched today (well yesterday)

anyone see it? I invited a couple of my friends over to watch NASA TV over
my broadband connection. was quite awesome.

and great material for jokes.

Tater Schuld wrote:
suitsat launched today (well yesterday)

anyone see it? I invited a couple of my friends over to watch NASA TV over
my broadband connection. was quite awesome.

and great material for jokes.

Was it loaded with assorted rubbish, to increase the sectional density?

"Ian Stirling" wrote in message
...
Tater Schuld wrote:
suitsat launched today (well yesterday)

anyone see it? I invited a couple of my friends over to watch NASA TV
over
my broadband connection. was quite awesome.

and great material for jokes.

Was it loaded with assorted rubbish, to increase the sectional density?

dont know, didnt eve think of jokes like that "oh, it's full of sh.."

was more along the line of "wait, dont disconnect MY suit, aaaaaaaaaa"

or "and here is the fresh new conspiracy footage to hit the nets 'russian
astronaut voted off the ISS, or MURDER!?!'"

on Sat, 4 Feb 2006 10:37:32 -0600, Tater Schuld sez:

` "Ian Stirling" wrote in message
` ...
` Tater Schuld wrote:
` suitsat launched today (well yesterday)
`
` anyone see it? I invited a couple of my friends over to watch NASA TV
` over
` my broadband connection. was quite awesome.
`
` and great material for jokes.
`
` Was it loaded with assorted rubbish, to increase the sectional density?

` dont know, didnt eve think of jokes like that "oh, it's full of sh.."

` was more along the line of "wait, dont disconnect MY suit, aaaaaaaaaa"

` or "and here is the fresh new conspiracy footage to hit the nets 'russian
` astronaut voted off the ISS, or MURDER!?!'"

None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was going
to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back to
the hatch 90 minutes later...

--
================================================== ========================
Pete Vincent
Disclaimer: all I know I learned from reading Usenet.

(pete) wrote in
:

None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was
going to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back
to the hatch 90 minutes later...

Guess you didn't read space.com's article:

http://space.com/missionlaunches/060204_exp12_eva2.html

"The Expedition 12 crew tossed SuitSat behind the ISS, in the opposite
direction of the station’s relative motion..."

--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

In article ,
pete wrote:
None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was going
to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back to
the hatch 90 minutes later...

It's got a lot more surface area per unit mass than the station does, so
it will be affected more strongly by air drag. And yes, that will make a
noticeable difference even within one orbit -- it'll come close, but it
won't return to quite the same place.
--
spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer
mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. |

Henry Spencer wrote:
In article ,
pete wrote:
None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was going
to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back to
the hatch 90 minutes later...

It's got a lot more surface area per unit mass than the station does, so
it will be affected more strongly by air drag. And yes, that will make a
noticeable difference even within one orbit -- it'll come close, but it
won't return to quite the same place.


Someone will undoubtedly propose a new sport - spacejumping. Try to
jump at an angle that compensates for the drag and gets you back to the
station the next time around :-)

John Halpenny

(Henry Spencer) wrote in :

In article ,
pete wrote:
None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was going
to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back to
the hatch 90 minutes later...

It's got a lot more surface area per unit mass than the station does, so
it will be affected more strongly by air drag. And yes, that will make a
noticeable difference even within one orbit -- it'll come close, but it
won't return to quite the same place.

Since the suit was deliberately deployed in the retrograde direction, there
was no possibility of recontact even if the ballistic coefficients matched.

--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

wrote in message
oups.com...

Someone will undoubtedly propose a new sport - spacejumping. Try to
jump at an angle that compensates for the drag and gets you back to the
station the next time around :-)

now that sounds like fun!

on Tue, 07 Feb 2006 08:02:40 -0600, Jorge R. Frank sez:
` (pete) wrote in
` :

` None of the items I heard about it bothered to explain how it was
` going to be set adrift in such a way that it wouldn't drift right back
` to the hatch 90 minutes later...

` Guess you didn't read space.com's article:

` http://space.com/missionlaunches/060204_exp12_eva2.html

` "The Expedition 12 crew tossed SuitSat behind the ISS, in the opposite
` direction of the station?s relative motion..."

Which by itself would achieve nothing: you then have two orbits at
a point of intersection, one of which has a velocity less than the
other by the amount developed by a human toss, and thus a lower
perogee, by what? perhaps 40mph out of 17,000, assuming a reasonable
amount of mobility in an EVA suit. I don't think that would take
it sufficiently lower to give a significantly larger bite into the
atmosphere. If so, the ISS is in a very precarious position. Delta P
between those two orbits is going to be tiny. ...I will buy Henry's
explanation, though it does seem to me that with all the solar panels
and hollow crew modules, the ISS itself must have a fairly low
mass/drag ratio.

--
================================================== ========================
Pete Vincent
Disclaimer: all I know I learned from reading Usenet.