| Date: | 2001-12-08 00:13:00 | |
| Sender: | Mike Pearlman, Director ILRS Central Bureau <Carey Noll <noll@cddisa.gsfc.nasa.gov>> | |
| Subject: | [SLR-Mail] No. 852: WESTPAC Notice | |
| Author: | Mike Pearlman, Director ILRS Central Bureau | |
| Content: | ******************************************************************************** SLR Electronic Mail 2001-12-08 00:13:00 UTC Message No. 852 ******************************************************************************** Author: Mike Pearlman, Director ILRS Central Bureau Subject: WESTPAC Notice Dear Colleague: Since several new satellite missions are being added to the ILRS roster during the next few months, we are examining the ILRS tracking priority list to see which satellites may be deleted in order to relieve the tracking schedule. Although the SLR data yield on the WESTPAC Satellite over the past three years has never been bountiful, we have had almost no data over the past several months. Only a few passes have been acquired during the past two weeks. This dearth of data may be due to the difficulty in making predictions on a sun synchronous satellite during high solar activity. It may also be due in part to the unique properties of the retroreflectors. However, tracking resources are now being expended on an activity that does not appear to be very fruitful. Would there be any serious impact on your activities if we were to stop tracking WESTPAC? So far, we have queried the analysis community. The responses to date indicate there is little interest in continuing the tracking. We solicit any additional your responses. If there is no strong motivation to continue, we plan to delete WESTPAC from the ILRS Tracking Priority List as of December 21. Best regards, Dr. Michael R. Pearlman Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics 60 Garden St. Cambridge MA 02138 tel. (617) 495-7481 fax. (617) 495-7105 e-mail. mpearlman@cfa.harvard.edu From: Carey Noll ******************************************************************************** |