S CA: 2 Iridium flares Friday
Mark Hanning-Lee (mhanning-lee@syagen.com)
Thu, 17 Dec 1998 14:49:55 -0800
Hi, viewers in Southern California get a chance for 2 Iridium flares
within a few minutes tomorrow, Friday. I'll give general information,
but urge you to go to the GSOC web site or run your favorite software
for precise times and brightnesses.
The first will be a normal Iridium flare at ~17:16:22, give or take a
few s, from Iridium 23, which will be brighter on the E side of the
urban area. That will be seen to the right of Fomalhaut, the only
brightish star below Jupiter.
The second will be a series of flashes from the tumbling Iridium 20 at
~17:20:06. That will be brighter near the middle of the urban area.
It'll be seen about 10 degrees high at az. 280 degrees, just N of W.
Much more challenging ;-). If you can locate this position in the sky
quite well, I guess that low-magnification binoculars might help. The
bright star Vega will be at about azimuth 300 degrees (bit over a
hands-length to the right of the flare) and 35 degrees high.
Best, Mark