Gerhard HOLTKAMP wrote: > Just observed a Lacrosse 5 (2005-016A) pass from my position at 49.8822N, > 8.6558E. > I picked it up near Psi UMa at 20:17:27 UT (13-AUG-06) at about mag 5. It > slowly brightened to a little less than mag 4 by the time it passed Beta UMa > at 20:18:21 UT. Between 20:18:33 and 20:18:50 it brightened by about half a > mag but I would not call this a proper flare. Then it dimmed again to below > mag 4 and showed a distinctly reddish color (before that it was colorless). > I then had to reposition my scope due to local obstacles and picked up > Lacrosse 5 again when it passed Gamma Cas at 20:21:05 UT by which time is was > slightly brighter than Gamma Cas (let's say mag 1.5). This could have been > part of a flare but it should have been quite bright in that part of the sky > anyway. Some 10 or 15 seconds after that it dimmed again rather quickly to > something like mag 4 or less and once again showed a reddish color. It stayed > like that for the rest of the pass (I followed it for another minute or so) > with very minute fluctuations in brightness. I had a similar experience on the same transit. I waited for Lacrosse expecting it to be bright enough so that I did not need binoculars. It was not bright and I picked it up when it was already between alpha UMa en gamma UMi. I used my stopwatch to get the times of maximum brightness and got the following values of time and brightness: 20:18:50.7 mag 1.0 20:18:56.1 mag 0.8 20:19:17.3 mag ? 20:19:26.5 mag ? 20:19:35.0 mag ? 20:19:43.7 mag 1.5 20:19:55.2 mag 1.3 20:20:06.0 mag 1.3 timing accuracy: +/- 0.4 seconds mag accuracy: +/-0.3 Bram Dorreman from COSPAR 4160: lat: 51.27931° N = 51° 16' 45.5" long: 5.47683° E = 5° 28' 36.6" ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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