Question AMSO Earth landings always in the dark?

[MetalMania]

I've been spending a good amount of time on AMSO lately (could it be I'm finally getting a clue on using IMFD!?!) but I'm a little baffled by something. I've been trying to follow the historical timelines of the flights for the major events when I can. Sometimes things just don't coincide, obviously trajectories won't be exactly the same, orbit insertions won't be the same as actual, etc. So generally I'm happy if things are "pretty close". I've been able to get most of my Re-Entry times pretty close to the historic times, usually within a few minutes, and my splashdown locations are generally within a few degrees of the target/actual locations. However one thing that seems to be consistent is that I'm always doing the ReEntry and landing in the dark. I don't think that happened in reality, the video and pictures as I recall seeing are always in daylight.

How closely should the Earth/Moon positions and surface locations due to rotation be in Orbiter/AMSO? I could be wrong but I don't think I'm that far off from my targets in either location or time, it seems like I'm always an hour or two before dawn at splashdown yet only off by a few minutes of the historical GET.

Maybe there's something else I should adjust, but increasing the "Hint" value in IMFD's Base Approach before TEI doesn't seem to really affect my ReEntry GET much, until it makes a big jump that adds like another day to the flight.

Does this happen with anyone else, or are you guys able to hit your target locations in the daytime?

 

[Saturn V]

As far as I'm aware, Apollos 8 & 11 splashed down just before dawn (approximately 15 minutes before sunrise according to "Moon Men Return" - a documentation of the recovery forces' efforts by Scott Carmichael). Recovery was initiated just after sunrise.

I can't swear to that timeframe for the other missions, but there certainly is precedent.

 

[kuddel]

Hi,

according to this book (Page 581):

|Apollo 7|Apollo 8|Apollo 9|Apollo 10|Apollo 11|Apollo 12|Apollo 13|Apollo 14|Apollo 15|Apollo 16|Apollo 17
GET |260:09:03|147:00:42:00|241:00:54|192:03:23|195:18:35|244:36:25|142:54:41|216:01:58.1|295:11:53.0|265:51:05|301:51:59
KSC Date|22 Oct 1968|27 Dec 1968|13 Mar 1969|26 May 1969|24 Jul 1969|24 Nov 1969|17 Apr 1970|09 Feb 1971|07 Aug 1971|27 Apr 1972|19 Dec 1972
GMT Date|22 Oct 1968|27 Dec 1968|13 Mar 1969|26 May 1969|24 Jul 1969|24 Nov 1969|17 Apr 1970|09 Feb 1971|07 Aug 1971|27 Apr 1972|19 Dec 1972
KSC Time|07:11:48 a.m.|10:51:42 a.m.|12:00:54 p.m.|12:52:23 a.m.|12:50:35 p.m.|03:58:25 p.m.|01:07:41 p.m.|04:05:00 p.m.|04:45:53 p.m.|02:45:05 p.m.|02:24:59 p.m.
Time Zone|EDT|EST|EST|EDT|EDT|EST|EST|EST|EDT|EST|EST
GMT Time|11:11:48|15:51:42|17:00:54|16:52:23|16:50:35|20:58:25|18:07:41|21:05:00|20:45:53|19:45:05|19:24:59
Splashdown Site (Ocean)|Atlantic|Pacific|Atlantic|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific|Pacific
Latitude (°N)|27.63|8.10|23.22|-15.07|13.30|-15.78|-21.63|-27.02|26.13|-0.70|-17.88
Longitude (°E)|-64.15|-165.00|-67.98|-164.65|-169.15|-165.15|-165.37|-172.67|-158.13|-156.22|-166.11

I hope I did not make many mistakes when copying the values from the original to this table...
All errors are mine

Now have fun to get the night/day/dawn for your favorite Mission

/Kuddel

 

[Mandella]

If I remember correctly, early dawn gives the best conditions (stillest air) for helicopter pickup operations, thus the inconvenient time for those of us simulating the operation.

I just crank up the ambient light for the descent, then time accelerate once splashed down to a good time for the pickup.

 

[NukeET]

Apollo 15 splashed after dawn local time. Otherwise, they wouldn't have gotten excellent footage of the CM descending on only 2 of 3 chutes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-Vd75Ptg9I

 

[MetalMania]

Well, after looking at the table maybe I'll get different results on the next flights. I've gotten through Apollo 11, but the rest all have later spalshdown times. I have all the historic times in a table like this but hadn't really looked ahead at the flights I haven't done yet. I know I've seen photos and video of capsules coming down in daylight, but don't know which flights they were. I just assumed they would all have been in daylight so the recovery ships would be able to see them in the event of a chute or flotation problem. My Apollo 9 landing was in daylight, but that was mid-day in the Atlantic vs. pre dawn in the Pacific. All of my landings are within a few minutes of the historical GET (closest was 2 min, furthest was about 20 min early), so I thought maybe the Earth's rotational position towards the Sun might not quite match what it actually was but maybe it's pretty close after all.

Screenshots don't look so great when it's dark out!

 

[kuddel]

Hi MetalMania,
reading your post, saying that your GET is more ore less equal to the table and your GMT is close as well, I can only assume that your longitude might be off. That would definitely make a difference in local time / lighting conditions, right?
I don't think that Orbiter is very far off with the relative positions of Sun and Earth, but I didn't test it.

Nevertheless, happy Orbiting (or should I say "splashdowning" )

/Kuddel