Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!rpi!uupsi!rodan!amichiel
From: amichiel@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Allen J Michielsen)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Re: Atlantis's 62-degree inclination
Keywords: 57-degrees was the max
Message-ID: <2256@rodan.acs.syr.edu>
Date: 27 Feb 90 16:26:47 GMT
References: <3197@scicom.AlphaCDC.COM>
Reply-To: amichiel@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Allen J Michielsen)
Organization: Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY
Lines: 28

In article <3197@scicom.AlphaCDC.COM> wats@scicom.AlphaCDC.COM (Bruce Watson)
>elements based on the Av week information.  CNN is repoorting
>roughly the same thing by mentioning that observers  along the
>East coast should be a good show since the flight azimuth required

>to exceed the 57-degree limit.  The question is:  Could it be
>that Atlantis will go into a 57-deg and the KH-12 (or whatever)
>will go from there to 62-deg? 

I just happen to have seen a in depth CNN story on exactly this over the 
weekend.  CNN was interviewing some suit from NASA, KSC or JSC.  He made it
VERY clear (although this doesn't prove fact...) that the 57 limits were
nominally set by NASA for downrange safety.  The experience base with the
shuttle and recovering the boosters,.... has proved to their satisfaction that
57 is very conservative, and that this nominal figure can be increased when
needed.  This flight will go through 62, and this is not the new max or limit.
57 is still the limit, but it can & will be exceeded when required by an amout
that may well exceed 62 also (maybe as the KH's get even heavier...).

While not getting into the physics, or opening a can of worms regarding the
different possibilities of going from a launch angle of like 57 to a orbital
incline of 62, the amount of energy required changes at a rate approaching
the cube of the change in mass.  The encyclopedia of satellites provides
information by which example data can be backed out to ballpark data.  It
becomes clear that for a object a big as a KH the cost of buying ground
insurance for damage is much more efficient (but politically & socially
less acceptable {probably}).
al