TO:  All GCN Notice recipients
RE:  AGILE Pointing Direction Notice is available
DT:  05 Jul 08

INTRODUCTION

The AGILE spacecraft Pointing Direction GCN Notice is now available.
They are available by the socket method and the email-based
(full format & cell/pager fmts) methods.

The AGILE spacecraft observes the sky by making "stare mode" pointings
every 14-30 days.  During these pointing sessions, the spacecraft
slowly drifts across the sky at a rate of about 1deg/day.

The GCN/AGILE_POINTING_DIRECTION Notice gives the current RA,Dec
pointing direction every 8 hours.


GROUND-BASED OBSERVATION STRATEGIES:
(This is useful mostly for robotic telescopes)
The RA,Dec information in this notice can be used (a) to obtain
pre-burst images by having your telescope "follow along" (granted
image tiling is needed given the large FOV of the AGILE insgtruments),
or at the very least, (b) it can be used to reduce the slew-time
to the new burst target.


ACTION ITEM:
If you want to receive this AGILE Pointing Direction notice type,
please send me a request to have them enabled.  (And/or if you have
any other changes to your configuration.  And a reminder about
the 3 new SuperAGILE burst position notices announced last week.)
You can do this by forwarding this email to  scott@milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov


NOTICE CONTENT:

An example of the AGILE Pointing Direction Notice (full-format email) is given below.
It contains the current RA,Dec pointing direction at the time
of the notice.  It also gives the start and end times of the
"observing session" (ie that typically 14-30 day period of looking
at a given region of the sky).

    TITLE:           GCN/AGILE NOTICE
    NOTICE_DATE:     Sat 05 Jul 08 14:00:00 UT
    NOTICE_TYPE:     AGILE Pointing Direction
    CURR_POINT_RA:   167.898d {+11h 11m 35s} (J2000),
                     167.996d {+11h 11m 59s} (current),
                     167.323d {+11h 09m 18s} (1950)
    CURR_POINT_DEC:  -47.899d {-47d 53' 55"} (J2000),
                     -47.945d {-47d 56' 42"} (current),
                     -47.627d {-47d 37' 36"} (1950)
    START_DATE:      14647 TJD;   182 DOY;   08/06/30
    START_TIME:      43200.00 SOD {12:00:00.00} UT
    END_DATE:        14678 TJD;   213 DOY;   08/07/31
    END_TIME:        43200.00 SOD {12:00:00.00} UT
    SUN_POSTN:       105.10d {+07h 00m 24s}  +22.71d {+22d 42' 42"}
    SUN_DIST:         90.30 [deg]   Sun_angle= -4.2 [hr] (East of Sun)
    MOON_POSTN:      140.31d {+09h 21m 13s}  +15.63d {+15d 37' 35"}
    MOON_DIST:        68.21 [deg]
    MOON_ILLUM:      9 [%]
    GAL_COORDS:      286.14, 11.69 [deg] galactic lon,lat of the pointing direction
    ECL_COORDS:      194.22,-47.45 [deg] ecliptic lon,lat of the pointing direction
    COMMENTS:        AGILE Pointing Direction.  
    COMMENTS:        The SuperAGILE FOV is ~60deg diameter.
    COMMENTS:        The GRID instrument FOV is ~120deg diameter.



MORE INFORMATION:
Can be found at: http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/agile.html
The socket packets contents can be found at:
http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/sock_pkt_def_doc.html


Sincerely,
Scott

Scott Barthelmy                      NASA-GSFC, Code 661, Greenbelt, MD   20771
PHONE:  301-286-3106                 (office)       CELL:   301-346-3733
FAX:    301-286-1684                 (1st choice,  -1682 2nd choice)
EMAIL:  scott@lheamail.gsfc.nasa.gov
PAGER:  3013463733@cingularme.com
WEB:    http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn