Re: Chandra visibility
Sean Sullivan (sean@golux.org)
Sat, 24 Jul 1999 01:03:33 -0400 (EDT)
In response to your post on Chandra's brightness. My calculations:
Perigee is aronud 10,000 km post-thrusting, I think. That makes perigee
16 times farther than Hubble. Assuming same intrinsic magnitude, that
makes Chandra 1/16^2 (1/256) as bright. That's almost exactly 6
magnitudes fainter. If Hubble is around +1 or +0 on favorable passes,
that makes a perigee Chandra around +7 or +6. Question then is if there
are any unusually bright surfaces, but even assuming not, it ought to be
findable in binoculars. Even from northerly latitudes (like Boston) that
don't get nice views of the 28-deg LEO objects :)
Of course, perigee passes aren't that common. But they would have wide
visibility, and stand a good chance of being sunlit. Aside from being
non-flashing, it might be a bit similar to a Centaur in terms of
brightness at those altitudes.
Well, I figure you got to see it in the clean room. I'll have to settle
for my backyard :)
-- Sean
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Sean Sullivan Boston-MA-USA http://sullivan.tsx.org