The INTERBALL Tail PROBE orbital elements


| Instead of the introduction | Format of the orbital elements | Estimation of the extrapolation errors |

Two kinds of the INTERBALL Tail probe orbital elements' collections are presented here.
  • The first one contains the orbital elements, determined by KIAM (Ballistic center at the Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics of Russian Academy of Sciences) during the treatment of the in-flight SC trajectory measurements. This data are connected with the last point of the used measuring time intervals. The orbit determination mean square error of 30-40 km inside the measuring intervals was estimated by KIAM. To provide the spacecraft motion calculation on the base of this data with the accuracy not less the one estimated during the orbit determination it is necessary to use backward in time integration. Otherwise the additional error appears caused by the SC motion extrapolation outside the measuring interval.
  • The backward in time integration was fulfilled at IKI for Tail probe orbit from now up to the launch. The resulting orbital elements replaced the original ones. These modified orbital elements are connected now with the initial points of the measuring time interval and are valid to use for the standard scheme of the forward integration (with accuracy not worth then one obtained during orbit determination).

    The orbital elements are presented in the same format F1, as a state vectors (the satellite position and velocity) in the inertial frame (Standard reference of the Earth's equator and Equinox J2000) in both collections.

    The ballistic center at KIAM continue its efforts to improve the orbit determinations accuracy by the after-flight reconstruction The new orbital elements collection will be available here.

  • Dr. Victoria Prokhorenko vprokhor@iki.rssi.ru
    Click here for more information.
    Last modified 25 July 1999


    IKI RAN | SSC IKI RAN | INTERBALL mission