SB SAREX @ AMSAT $STS-79.022 STS-79 SAREX Bulletin Number 22 Silver Spring, Maryland USA September 25, 1996 @ 1600 UTC The weather forecast for tomorrow's scheduled landing at Kennedy Space Center, the prime landing site, appears to be favorable, with scattered clouds and light winds forecast for the two landing opportunities there. The first opportunity calls for a landing of Atlantis at 12:13 UTC, with a backup opportunity 90 minutes later. There are three landing opportunities available at the backup landing site at California's Edwards Air Force Base, where landing support will be in place, if needed. Because Atlantis is coming home with only two operational auxiliary power units, more restrictive weather criteria will be in effect. Crosswinds will be required to be 10 knots or less, with ceilings above 10,000 feet and visibility greater than 7 miles. Weather permitting in selected areas of the United States and Canada, there will be STS-79 entry sighting opportunities. During STS-78, radio amateurs used data similar to that given below to attempt 2-way terrestrial contacts by reflecting their signals off the orbiter entry ionized trail. Anyone who would like to participate in such an experiment this time is invited to monitor the AMSAT HF Net frequencies of 3.840, 14.282, 18.155 and 21.280 MHz SSB for this as-yet uncoordinated activity. Amateurs are encouraged to post their observations to the SAREX Internet e-mail list, sarex@amsat.org. Courtesy of Gil Carman, WA5NOM, of the JSC Amateur Radio Club (W5RRR) in Houston, Texas, here is the STS-79 KSC Entry data. It is based on a landing of September 26, 1996 on orbit 160. CITY TIME ELEV AZ ELSUN BOOM 1. Vancouver, BC 11:49:18 UTC 16.4 N ( .0) -21.5 13:27 2. Seattle, WA 11:49:26 UTC 7.9 N (360.0) -21.7 23:36 3. Spokane, WA 11:50:19 UTC 8.5 N ( 5.0) -18.5 22:05 4. Calgary, Alberta 11:50:49 UTC 80.7 S (180.0) -15.2 03:56 5. Great Falls, MT 11:51:29 UTC 10.2 NNE ( 12.4) -14.4 18:54 6. Moose Jaw, Sask. 11:52:17 UTC 37.3 SSW (200.2) -10.0 06:14 7. Minot, ND 11:53:15 UTC 74.5 NNE ( 18.0) -7.4 03:53 8. Bismarck, ND 11:53:31 UTC 24.1 NNE ( 25.4) -7.2 08:53 9. Winnipeg, Manitoba 11:53:44 UTC 12.2 SSW (209.9) -4.5 15:57 10. Fargo, ND 11:54:15 UTC 87.8 S (180.0) -4.4 03:40 11. Sioux Falls, SD 11:54:47 UTC 10.4 NNE ( 30.8) -4.4 17:33 12. Des Moines, IA 11:55:46 UTC 8.9 NE ( 35.2) -2.0 19:23 13. Minneapolis, MN 11:55:12 UTC 67.9 NNE ( 33.0) -1.8 03:51 14. Keokuk,IA 11:56:31 UTC 9.2 NE ( 39.9) -0.2 18:23 15. Memphis, TN 11:58:24 UTC 2.2 NE ( 48.5) 1.4 35:16 16. Sterling, IL 11:56:33 UTC 27.0 NE ( 42.2) 1.1 07:22 17. Peoria, IL 11:56:50 UTC 16.0 NE ( 42.8) 1.3 11:32 18. Madison, WI 11:56:19 UTC 87.0 S (180.0) 1.2 03:26 19. Rockford, IL 11:56:33 UTC 53.1 NE ( 42.7) 1.5 04:14 20. Chicago, IL 11:56:55 UTC 82.5 WSW (243.5) 2.7 03:22 21. Gary, IN 11:57:03 UTC 86.2 WSW (242.1) 2.9 03:20 22. Birmingham, AL 12:00:18 UTC 4.4 ENE ( 63.7) 4.6 25:09 23. Nashville, TN 11:58:55 UTC 8.1 NE ( 54.8) 4.1 18:15 24. MSFC, AL 11:59:43 UTC 5.9 ENE ( 61.4) 4.5 21:53 25. Indianapolis, IN 11:57:48 UTC 47.7 NE ( 53.6) 4.1 04:19 26. Louisville, KY 11:58:22 UTC 23.9 NE ( 54.6) 4.7 07:32 27. Atlanta, GA 12:00:49 UTC 11.2 ENE ( 71.2) 6.7 12:51 28. Knoxville, TN 11:59:41 UTC 25.7 ENE ( 65.8) 6.6 06:35 29. Augusta, GA 12:01:25 UTC 76.0 E ( 82.4) 8.8 02:41 30. Jacksonville, FL 12:04:07 UTC 44.1 ENE ( 60.6) 10.0 02:48 Note: These times and elevations are at the point of closest approach (peak elevation) for each city. ELSUN is the Sun's elevation for that city at that time. BOOM is the estimated length of time (MIN:SEC) after closest approach when the sonic boom may be heard. However, it is unlikely that the boom can be heard if peak elevation is less than about 20 deg. Plasma trail visibility is best with sun elevations less than approximately -10 deg. [Radio amateurs are encouraged to relay these SAREX bulletins to their local packet BBS as long as the Bulletin IDentification (BID) is preserved. The BID is the character string beginning with the dollar sign ($), for example as in "SB SAREX @ AMSAT $STS-79.022" without the quotation marks.] Submitted by Pat Kilroy, WD8LAQ for Frank H. Bauer, KA3HDO and the SAREX Working Group. /EX ======================================================================== Patrick L. Kilroy Phone: 301-286-5910 Engineer (in motion) Fax: 301-286-1695 NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center E-mail: pat.kilroy@gsfc.nasa.gov Building 6, Code 311 WWW URL: http://arioch.gsfc.nasa.gov/ Greenbelt, Maryland 20771 310/310.html ========================================================================= . .