Orbit 13858

First frame of movie for orbit 13858

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This is a noon-midnight orbit that avoids the region of the South Atlantic Anomaly; the spacecraft pointing strategy is "j-perp", with the ram avoidance constraint in effect. Behavior is qualitatively very similar to the previous orbit (orbit 13854), with perhaps some additional interference from the ram constraint. The orbit starts with the instruments pointed perpendicular to the field until the magnitude rises above 0.3 Gauss at 78285 seconds UT. The spacecraft then points the instruments antiparallel to the projection of the field into the sun-normal plane, with interference from the ram constraint from about 78549 to 78867 sec, coast mode from 79659 to 80319 sec, and another entry of the weak-field region at 80367 sec. Once the instruments are swiveled around to point perpendicular to the field, coast mode is again encountered from 80841 to 81531 sec, and then the field rises above 0.3 Gauss at 81825 sec, now in the southern hemisphere. A brief period of dayside coast mode occurs from 83001 to 83067 sec; when this ends the magnetic field has rotated in the orbital plane so that the spacecraft must flip 180° to point the instruments parallel to the projected field again, which is impeded by the ram constraint from about 83223 sec until the field magnitude drops below 0.3 Gauss again at 83481 sec.

The most dramatic roll here is at around 78300-78400 sec, when the spacecraft nearly enters dayside coast mode as the magnetic field direction and the sunline come to point very nearly antiparallel, and the spacecraft swings the instruments around to keep them antiparallel to the tiny and rapidly rotating projection of the field into the sun-normal plane. Perhaps a switch in the pointing strategy in the strong-field region to something involving the zenith rather than the magnetic field would be useful in eliminating these maneuvers.

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new 9 March 1999

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