Iridium 42

 1997-077A

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Following the two Iridium MFS dummy satellites, Iridium 42 and 44 were the first to be launched on the Chinese vehicle. After a brief period in the operational orbit, SV42 was lowered to the engineering orbit.

Iridium 42
Date	Time	Event	Orbit
1997 Dec 8	0716:49	Launch by CZ2-SD	TY
	0719	Stage 1 sep
	0720	Fairing sep
	0722	Stage 2 MECO
	0727	Stage 2 VECO, sep	93.09 185 x 665 x 86.3
	0805?	SD burn
	0807?	SD sep	626 x 636 x 86.3
	0816	Deployment complete
	0816	SD orbit lower	92.97 209 x 630 x 86.2
1997 Dec 8			97.34 626 x 636 x 86.3
1997 Dec 14			97.40 629 x 639 x 86.3
1997 Dec 16			98.36 678 x 681 x 86.4
1997 Dec 18			100.33 771 x 776 x 86.4
1997 Dec 19			100.38 775 x 778 x 86.4
1997 Dec 23	0349		100.42 774 x 782 x 86.4
		Orbit lower
	1352		100.15 761 x 769 x 86.4
	1852		100.20 766 x 769 x 86.4
1997 Dec 28			100.21 767 x 770 x 86.4
1998 Jan 5	0603		100.23 768 x 770 x 86.4
	2245		100.14 762 x 767 x 86.4
1998 Jan 8			100.15 763 x 768 x 86.4
1998 Mar 9			100.17 764 x 768 x 86.4
2004 Feb 14			100.40 776 x 779 x 86.4
2007 Jun 29			100.40 775 x 779 x 86.4