STARSHINE ORBIT OBIT

The Starshine satellite is no longer orbiting the earth! It was last tracked at 15:08 UTC on February 18, 2000, and apparently flamed out over the open ocean and or in broad daylight on its 4211th revolution around the earth. Here's a ground projection of Starshine's final orbit. We've superimposed on this plot the center points of the various predictions of its re-entry footprint. We are deeply grateful to the various elements of the U.S. Space Command for relaying updated orbital element sets and re-entry predictions to us via the Orbital Information Group at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center every few hours during Starshine's final days in orbit. We also appreciate the strenuous efforts of Alan Pickup in Edinburgh, Scotland, Harro Zimmer in Berlin, Germany, Chris Peat in Munich, Germany, and George Varros in Mt. Airy, MD, USA. These individuals really burned the midnight oil to generate their final visibility and re-entry predictions and get them posted on their various, affiliated web sites in a timely manner.

All of you who have enjoyed being a part of the Starshine project might care to send an email message to Administrator Dan Goldin (dan.goldin@hq.nasa.gov), thanking him and the entire NASA organization for getting Starshine into orbit last June. You might also thank Mr. Ed Senasack (esenasack@space.nrl.navy.mil) and his team of engineers at the Naval Research Laboratory for building the satellite structure. And, finally, please don't forget my wife, Phyllis Moore (physmoore@aol.com), who assembled and shipped your mirror polishing kits to you. Out of the dozens and dozens of people who made huge contributions of time, effort and resources to make Starshine happen, these are the most important of all. Stay tuned to this web site for the final wrap up of the Starshine mission and for some thoughts about where we go from here.

We're sorry to say that we don't believe it would have been possible for anyone to have photographed Starshine's re-entry, because it seems to have occurred over the open ocean or in bright sunlight. Therefore, we'll keep the $5000 prize money in the bank and come up with another contest that will be in line with the overall educational objectives of the Starshine program. Your suggestions are welcome.

Gil Moore
Director
Project Starshine
3855 Sierra Vista Road
Monument, CO, USA
(719) 488-0721
gilmoore12@aol.com

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