Three Frames from STS-80: Visualisation · Signals from the Periphery

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THE ORBIT

Subject

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Value

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State

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THREE FRAMES FROM STS-80
NASA-UAP-D030 · D031 · D032 · 1996
a photograph without a range fixes one number: D/R
no range, no size, no interval, no identification
an ice flake at 30 m and a ship at 400 km take the same picture
only a thruster splits the ray, and stills cannot fire one
restore the motion · stack the frames · walk the line

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Evidence

fact ⇄ what kind of claim · live

Three frames, one object, captions that read as a sequence

PURSUE Release 04, cleared 10 July 2026; the descriptions are the release's own

REPORTED

No range, no size, no interval, no speed, no identification

the release's silences, carried as silences; the briefing adds none

REPORTED

A point photograph fixes exactly one number: D/R

theta = D/R, and sunlit brightness ~ (D/R)^2 rides the same ray

EXACT

7.70 km/s, 91.5 min, the limb 18.6° below level

circular-orbit closed form at 350 km; the geometry every window shot obeys

EXACT

Δv ∝ 1/m: 0.08 s of RCS gives a 2 mm flake 1.67 m/s, the orbiter 2.8 mm/s

momentum flux over mass, closed form; the test that needs video, not stills

EXACT

The drawn arc, the staged 2′ size, the window framing, the dawn light

invented from the captions and labelled; the release publishes no coordinates

MODELLED

The famous video, and NASA's ice-and-debris attribution for it

both attach to the footage; the release's stills carry no identification either way

REPORTED

What three frames without a range amount to

the one question this bench refuses to close for you

READING

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The orbit

SequenceT+0 s

The three captions as one motion: D030 off the limb, the D031 tumble at mid-arc, D032 onto the disc. The clock runs on the interval dial below.

Film insetwhat the window sees: identical in both readings

The frames

The dials

Assumed range30 m

The number the release does not give, on a log dial from 5 m to 2,000 km. Implied size, speed and brightness follow it exactly. The two named readings are stops on this dial.

Frame interval30 s

Also not in the release: film carries no timestamps. Every implied speed reads through this dial, so it stays in the open.

Flake size (plume card)2.0 mm

For the plume test only: delta-v scales as 1/D at fixed range. Ice answers a thruster; a ship does not.

Thruster pulse80 ms

A primary RCS pulse, 40 ms to 1 s. The orbiter's own delta-v from the same pulse is the dashed line on the card.

Display

Labels

Readout · live

Staged angular size

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Assumed range

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Implied size

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Implied crossing speed

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Sunlit magnitude

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Plume Δv (flake)

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What is exact vs modelled here

Exact: the orbit (7.70 km/s, 91.5 min), the limb geometry (Earth 142.9° wide, limb 18.6° below level), the degeneracy ray theta = D/R, the sunlit-magnitude formula and its ride along the same ray, Clohessy-Wiltshire relative motion, and the plume test's delta-v arithmetic. Reported: the three captions, the catalogue fields, the mission record, the folklore video and NASA's attribution for it, the STS-48 and Apollo 17 siblings. Modelled: the staged arc, the staged 2-arcmin size, the window framing, the dawn lighting, the film schematics. There is no fitted constant anywhere on this bench.

The model, in full

The line applies closed forms to one staged angular track: theta = D/R for size, omega·R for crossing speed, m = m☉ − 2.5·log₁₀(p·(D/2R)²) for brightness, all functions of the range dial. The plume card divides an RCS pulse's momentum flux through a 20° cone at 20 m by an ice sphere's mass, giving delta-v ∝ 1/D, against the orbiter's F/M as reference. The orbit view places the limb by asin/acos(RE/r) at 350 km and moves the object on the staged arc at both named ranges. Every anchor is checked in scripts/sts-80-tune.mjs.

Where this instrument takes liberties

The release gives captions, not coordinates: the arc's 10° span, the 2′ apparent size, the elongation, the window field and the dawn sun are all invented staging consistent with the caption text, and each is labelled. The film schematics are drawings, not the released scans. The engine glow at the bells is staging too: on orbit the main engines are cold and OMS burns are brief, so the faint blue plumes are painted for legibility, not physics. The plume test is run as arithmetic on a hypothetical: no thruster firing is recorded in, or claimed for, these three frames.

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