Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 August 2015
Radio observations have clearly demonstrated that the kinematic twin-jet model (Milgrom 1979; Abell and Margon 1979) is the correct description of the general behavior of SS433 and have determined the orientation parameters that could not be obtained from the optical observations (Gilmore and Seaquist 1980; Hjellming and Johnston 1981 (HJ); Niell, Lockhart, and Preston 1981 (NLP)). Figure 1 shows the observed position angle of the radio jet at a distance of approximately from the core during the period 1979 May to 1981 May as determined from our VLBI measurements at 2.3 GHz. The mean position angle is 98°±2° for a 20° half-angle cone of precession about an inclination of 79° to the line of sight. The phase is consistent with the expected propagation time out to (1016cm) at a speed of 0.26c for a distance to SS433 of 5 kiloparsecs (HJ; NLP).