More on Iridium flares

Ron Lee (ronlee@pcisys.net)
Wed, 27 Aug 1997 06:14:47

Just reviewed Paul's posting from yesterday. Follows in part:

This morning, the same geometry recurred from Houston (26 October 1997
from 10:57:41 to 10:59:32) as the group passed through local elevation
34, azimuth 214 phase angle between 39 and 36 degrees. Again, a
spectacular performance! I attempted to carefully concentrate on the
maximum brilliance of each object and the time of rise and fade to
certain magnitude levels. As one object faded, another one generally
rose.

My comments now:

Other than the October month is really August  :),  he was observing
the same pass that I observed this morning..only a little earlier and
to his west, whereas mine was to the east.  Notice that his flared in
the southwest while mine were in the northeast and at a much lower
elevation  (az/el for mine   was 18/16).    Not being a great analyst
on sun/satellite/viewer angles, I cannot derive any conclusions from
this other than we are getting better info on when they do flare.

Ron Lee