Rc. Stone, Positions for the outer planets and many of their satellites. V. FASTT observations taken in 2000-2001, ASTRONOM J, 122(5), 2001, pp. 2723-2733
As part of an ongoing observing program with the Flagstaff Astrometric Scan
ning Transit Telescope (FASTT), this paper presents 1084 new equatorial pos
itions taken in 2000-2001 for the outer planets Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto,
as well as for 17 satellites of Jupiter-Neptune. All the positions were de
termined using differential reductions with reference stars taken from eith
er the ACT or Tycho-2 star catalog. An improvement in systematic accuracy w
as made by introducing a correction for small focal-plane errors, and the o
verall accuracy of FASTT observations has been improved as a result. When n
ew and old FASTT positions are compared with modern Jet Propulsion Laborato
ry (JPL) ephemerides, there is, in general, good agreement between FASTT po
sitions and theory, wherein mean differences in each coordinate are smaller
than 0."03 for the planets, and the agreement is usually better than 0."07
for the planetary satellites. In particular, the new JPL ephemerides for o
uter satellites of Jupiter (Himalia, Pasiphae, and Elara) are significantly
better than their older versions. Finally, Titania and Oberon, satellites
of Uranus, continue to show large offsets (>0."1) with respect to their pre
dicted positions.