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Class: Earth. Type: Geodetic. Destination: Medium Earth Orbit. Nation: USA. Agency: NASA.

100 foot diameter. balloon.

Typical orbit: 2953 km x 5207 km at 84 degrees inclination. Mass: 55 kg (121 lb). Associated Launch Vehicle: Thor Agena D SLV-2A.

Pageos Chronology

1966 June 24 - Pageos 1 - Launch Site: Vandenberg. Launch Vehicle: Delta. Mass: 55 kg (121 lb). Perigee: 3,913 km (2,431 mi). Apogee: 4,220 km (2,620 mi). Inclination: 85.40 deg. Period: 177.10 min.
The PAGEOS (Passive Geodetic Earth Orbiting Satellite) spacecraft was a 30.48-m inflatable sphere, and had no instrumentation on board. It was the second (following GEOS 1) NASA satellite in the National Geodetic Satellites Program. The launch, orbit, separation, inflation and initial operation were nominal, with more than 40 ground stations participating in the observation program. The orbit was generally considered too high for drag-density study, although some work was done in this area by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Additional Details: Pageos 1.

1966 June 24 - Pageos canister half - Launch Site: Vandenberg. Launch Vehicle: Delta. Perigee: 4,227 km (2,626 mi). Apogee: 4,255 km (2,643 mi). Inclination: 87.00 deg. Period: 181.50 min.

1966 June 24 - Pageos canister half - Launch Site: Vandenberg. Launch Vehicle: Delta. Perigee: 4,196 km (2,607 mi). Apogee: 4,276 km (2,656 mi). Inclination: 86.90 deg. Period: 181.40 min.

Bibliography:

McDowell, Jonathan, Jonathan's Space Home Page (launch records), Harvard University, 1997-present. Web Address when accessed: http://www.planet4589.org/jsr.html.
JPL Mission and Spacecraft Library, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 1997. Web Address when accessed: http://msl.jpl.nasa.gov/home.html.
McDowell, Jonathan, Launch Log, October 1998. Web Address when accessed: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~jcm/space/log/launch.html.
NASA Report, The Fabrication and Testing of Pageos 1, Web Address when accessed: http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19680016348_1968016348.pdf.

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