Jan 14, 2010 - Discovery Space has awarded an image from the ATV reentry observing campaign the third best astronomy picture of 2008!

Oct 28, 2009 - ATV Reentry Observing Campaign Workshop is a special session at the CEAS 2009 European Air and Space Conference in Manchester, UK. The meeting coordinates the post-flight analysis efforts that are underway.

March 9-12, 2009 -
ATV-1 "Jules Verne" MAC workshop, Re-Entry Emission Signatures IV, at ESA/ESTEC, Noordwijk, the Netherlands.

• Registration - deadline March 06.
• Presentations - deadline March 04. Please send a title and brief less than 100 word abstract of your presentation to Jason Hatton (ESA/ESTEC).
• Agenda - will be posted shortly.
• Directions - From Schiphol airport (AMS), take the train to Leiden (1 stop), then the bus to 'ESTEC'.

ATV MAC team at Papeete airport just after completing a successful observing campaign. [ Group photo 1: P. Jenniskens] [ Photo 2: E. James]

Early detection of the ATV reentry with SPOSH. Photo: Detlef Koschny.

November 05 - The raw data have been gathered now into an archive and an initial report identifying the key phenomena during entry was submitted to ESA. Initial results were presented at the Third IAASS conference in Rome (Oct. 21-23) and the 2nd Intrnational Atmospheric Reentry Association Days in Arcachon, France (Oct. 21-23). Our next step will be to form research teams that can address specific aspects of the reentry process, in preparation of a workshop in February.

Ron Dantowitz and Marek Kozubal obtained these blue and green spectra of ATV. Results are compared to those of two other instruments.

October 15 - Spectroscopic data identified the origin of different colors for different parts of the fragmenting ATV. The image above shows a compilation of data from a small region in the blue and green part of the spectrum from three instruments: a cooled CCD camera (Ron Dantowitz and Marek Kozubal of Dexter and Southfield Schools), a miniature Echelle spectrograph (Peter Jenniskens and David Holman of the SETI Institute), and a cooled CCD camera (Claire Webb and Mike Borden, students of the SETI REU and NASA Ames Exploration Academy programs).

October 07 - Additional images from the ATV reentry as observed from the DC8 aircraft are shown below. Click on each image to obtain a higher resolution version of the picture. All images are courtesy ESA/NASA.

Antoine Bavandi, ESA/ESTEC, obtained these still frames with a Sony 3CCD camcorder, owned by Mike Taylor of Utah State University. Composite: Peter Jenniskens.

David Sliski of Dexter and Southfield Schools captured the ATV reentry in this digitial still image from the DC8 aircraft.

Julian Nott disected the light emitted by ATV and its fragments during entry into its many colors, in a process called spectroscopy. Emission lines and bands identify some of the components of the fragments.

October 06 - A small 2-m size asteroid has been discovered that is on a collision course with Earth. The asteroid was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey at Mnt Lemon, Az. Called 2008 TC3, it is calculated to hit the north of Sudan at 02h 46m UT (+/- 5 minutes, 3 sigma) on October 7, 2008, just hours from now just before dawn. The impact location is longitude = 31.697E, latitude = +20.855N (+/- 140 km, 3 sigma). The meteor will radiate from the head of Pisces, just under the square of Pegasus, coincidentally from almost the same direction as ATV was approaching us last week! The impact speed will be considerably higher at 12.82 km/s. This is the very first time that an asteroid was observed in space before it hit the Earth. The entry will be fairly shallow, at an entry angle of 19 degrees from the horizon, and slow enough to drop meteorites in the general area. Source: Andrea Milani (University of Pisa, Italy), and Donald Yeomans (JPL, USA).

Update Oct 07: It is reported that this fireball was detected by an infrasound station in Kenya and observed by a pilot onboard a KLM flight. Keep tuned.

October 06 - The ATV reentry, in a still image from video by Jesse Carpenter and Bill Moede of NASA Ames, was NASA's Picture of the Day today: http://www.nasa.gov. The video itself (courtesy of ESA/NASA) is shown in low resolution at the ESA ATV blog website:
[The ATV reentry video (full screen)]

October 01 - ISS observations of the ATV reentry were successful too. It is reported that: "the FE-1 set up the Fialka-MV-KOSMOS hardware of the GFI-1 RELAXATION experiment hardware at SM window #9 and used its UV (ultraviolet) camera and spectrometer, controlled from Laptop 3, to record relaxation process imagery & plasma spectra of the ATV's fiery entry in the Earth's atmosphere at 9:31am EDT. Afterwards, Oleg tore down and stowed the hardware. [The return of ESA's first logistics vehicle began with a deorbit burn of 70 m/s delta-V at 8:58am. ATV1 breakup started at an altitude of about 75 km, with the remaining fragments splashing into the Pacific Ocean some 12 min later.]".

October 01 - ESA posts ATV re-entry video, obtained by Jesse Carpenter and Bill Moede of NASA Ames onboard the DC8 airborne laboratory. Re-entry video

	Click on each photo to view a larger image.

Still images from a high definition TV camera operated by Jessie Carpenter and Bill Moede of NASA Ames Research Center. The images were prepared by Eric James of the same group.

September 29 - The final minutes of ATV were more glorious than we had expected. A big piece continued until deep in the atmosphere and created a bright green fireball with a wake of hundreds of orange fragments. Both aircraft were directed to give us a prime view of the event. The re-entry appeared to be nominal, with the main break-up event close to the predicted time, kudos to ATV control center! The videos are spectacular, kudos to Ed Schilling, Eric James, Jesse Carpenter, and Bill Moede of NASA Ames, who provided the still images attached (extracted from the video). The data are impressive. My own Echelle spectrograph shows a wealth of emission lines. The main break-up event caused a bright flare with a puff of matter left behind. When ATV finally passed the DC8 aircraft, the fragment train was impressive. While operating the computer of my instrument, I glanced up through a window that perfectly framed the approaching meteor. This one is for eternity. A great homage to Jules Verne. - Peter Jenniskens

- with thanks to Barbara Vance of the SETI Institute, who provided the live updates at this site in the past week.

The light from one of many fragments of ATV is dissected into its colors, showing the dominant turquoise light from Aluminum Oxide bands, in this image by Chris Kitting, California State University East Bay

Still image of ATV when it passed by the DC8 aircraft, by Jeremie Vaubaillon, Caltech/Observatoire de Paris

September 29 - ESA posts first images from ATV reentry, transmitted shortly after the observation from the DC8 aircraft to ATV control center. First images

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