04-11-2019, 06:15 PM
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Master Modeler
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Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Fairbanks, Alaska
Posts: 6,507
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by blackshire
Nominal Orbit Insertion! The 85-second Stage 2 second burn increased the vehicle's velocity by 2800 m/s (meters per second), which will carry it 90,000 kilometers high--definitely an STO (Supersynchronous Transfer Orbit). Arabsat will separate from Stage 2 in about four minutes. After that, I suspect that the stage will perform a retro-burn to lower its perigee, to ensure a disposal burn-in (re-entry) soon.
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Arabsat 6A has separated and is climbing to its STO apogee; also, a call of "AOS Mauritius" could be heard, which bodes well (although it may have referred to the Stage 2 telemetry and/or video signals rather than any signals from Arabsat 6A). SpaceX makes such hard accomplishments *look* easy! |