Thursday, January 22, 1998

Falcon Gold

 1997-065B


The 15 kg Falcon Gold payload was built by cadets at the AF Academy, Colorado Springs. It remained attached to the AC-131 Centaur stage. Falcon Gold measures GPS signal strength at geostationary altitudes.

The experiment was a box-shaped device powered by batteries. It was activated 8000s after launch, when the primary DSCS payload was at a safe distance from Centaur.


Falcon Gold 
 

DateTimeEventOrbit  

1997 Oct 25  0046  Launch by Atlas IIA Centaur AC-131 CC SLC36A 
 0048? T+2:44? Atlas BECO 
 0048? T+2:47? Atlas BECO 
  T+3:53? Fairing 
  T+4:41? Atlas SECO 
 0050? T+4:43? Atlas sep 
 0051? T+5:00? Centaur MES-1 
 0056? T+10:07? Centaur MECO-1  150? x 900? x 29?  
 0108? T+22:17? Centaur MES-2 
 0109? T+23:43? Centaur MECO-2 
 0112  T+26:38 Centaur sep from DSCS/IABS 619.1 316 x 35771 x 25.3 (UN) 
 0259  T+2:13:20? FG activated  
1997 Oct 28  622.3 241 x 35294 x 26.4 (UN) 
1997 Nov 5  181 x 35202 x 26.30 (Falcon Gold) 
1997 Nov 9  0245  end of transmissions 

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