I bet that was a rewarding time for you -if a bit nail biting. Why does
the orbit decay faster? I would have thought that a tumbling object
would have the same average drag on the high upper atmosphere or is it
something else?

Cheers


Jeff Morris wrote:

"Navigator" wrote in message
...

Jeff Morris wrote:

This is my telescope:

http://history.nasa.gov/SP-466/p60.jpg

And where is it now?


Dust on the sea ...

It worked great for about a year and a half (scheduled for a 6 month mission)
but then it had a problem and lost 99% of its reaction gas, which is needed to
keep it stabile. We managed to keep it going for another 6 months with 24/7
attention, but then resources got diverted to for one of the early shuttle tests
(where they dropped the mock-up from a plane, I think) and it was lost. Once
they start tumbling the orbit decays quicker and it burned up in a year or so.
This was HEAO-2, also known as the Einstein Observatory. In many ways, it was a
predecessor to Hubble - my boss, Dr. Riccardo Giacconi, became the first
director of the Space Telescope Science Institute and was awarded the Nobel
Prize in 2002.

For goofy pictures of 70's haircuts (fortunately not mine):
http://history.nasa.gov/SP-466/ch6.htm