See Saters, We were very fortunate to have the low lying clouds open up just before the shuttle flew by. It became visible about 6:19 p.m. EST. The flames coming out the orbiter gave it the appearance of a roman candle and it was amazing to observe with binoculars. A ghostly shape of shuttle was barely visible just behind the flames. We were able to watch the MECO (main-engine cut-off) just before the craft blinked out. At that point the shuttle officially is inserted into orbit and then becomes an orbiter. It was a bit confusing at first because the shuttle launched several minutes later than 6:11 EST and we were not aware of this. When a bright orange dot suddenly appeared due south, as though it was coming straight at us, we knew this was the right object. A quick look at it with the binoculars confirmed this. There is nothing more exciting than watching a shuttle launch live :). Even if you are no where near Florida :). My husband has worked on the SRB's for years and has never actually seen a launch, so I figured this was a good opportunity! Best regards, Penny Fischer 40.297N -74.359W ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* Manager, Space Forum http://www.forumsamerica.com/space Monmouth Mobile Observer's Group Monmouth County, New Jersey http://www.monmouth.com/~govega/mmogindex.htm Penny Fischer's Astronomy Page http://www.monmouth.com/~govega *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Feb 08 2001 - 03:08:53 PST