DMSP 5D-2 F14 (USA 131) broke up on December 19, 2024

Why it is shown

• What the detector saw: no step in the parent’s own orbit; it found the breakup from its pieces.
• How it was confirmed: by 12 pieces catalogued in the parent’s orbital plane.
• The time shown: December 19, 2024, 2:10 AM UTC, as GCAT (J. McDowell) dates it, which is not a report.
• The detector’s own estimate: between Oct 6, 2024, 11:05 AM and Oct 8, 2024, 12:40 PM UTC.

The detector’s own reasons, as it wrote them:

• 12 fresh pieces under launch 1997-012 (62935, 62937, 62936, 62945, 62943, 62946, 62941, 62947, 62942, 62939, 62938, 62940), numbered above the catalogue's mark and first published after the cloud's first set, in the plane of 24753 (distance 1.0, 0.7, 0.6, 2.3, 1.6, 1.9, 0.8, 1.9, 1.3, 0.0, 0.3, 0.6 to the nearest plane of the launch's bodies), their semi-major axes centred 0.7 km from its, moving 13.2 m/s from it: a breakup of 24753, attributed from the pieces with no step seen on it
• propagated back, 8 pieces converge on 24753 at 2025-01-27 16:39, sigma 1013 min, missing it by 6110.3 km; each piece's closest approach to 24753: 8 of 8 cross it in the window, their median at 2024-10-07 11:53, half of them within 18.9 h of it and three quarters within 43.3 h (robust spread 28.0 h), the pieces 125.8 days old at it
• 13 new bodies under 1997-012 in 14 days against a background of 0.50 (0 in the year before): Poisson tail 1.3e-14, a burst
• 12 pieces in the plane of parent 24753 (distance under 3), moving 13.2 m/s, the semi-major axes spread over 233.2 km