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| NROL-91. Click image to enlarge |
On 24 September 2022 at 22:25:30 UT, with half an hour delay, ULA launched NROL-91, a Delta IV Heavy with a classified payload for the NRO. The payload is probably an electro-optical reconnaissance satellite in the KH-11 lineage (for more backgrounds see the previous post).
Six hours after the launch, the payload, USA 338, made a pass over the Netherlands and around 4:17 UTC (6:17 local time) was observed by Cees Bassa from Dwingeloo and by me from Leiden. It was visible by the naked eye with a brightness around magnitude +2.5 to +3.
The image above shows it ascending over the roof of my house, passing close to the Hyades cluster in Taurus. The image was taken with a Canon EOS 80D + Samyang 1.4/35 mm lens, 5 seconds at ISO 800. The sky was clear but with sacttered clouds, as can be seen in the image.
A very preliminary orbit fit suggests a 73.59 degree inclined, 376 x 415 km orbit. The RAAN difference with USA 290, an earlier launch of similar type, is ~99 degrees. When the orbit gets better established, these figures might still change somewhat.
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