I'm sure this is old news to most of you experienced satellite observers - By accident on the Fourth of July (July 5, 2013 5:37:00 UTC) while watching a fireworks display, several NASA friends and I saw ALOS coming up out of Scorpius heading toward the zenith. It remained steady at about magnitude 1 for about 20 seconds, disappeared for 10 seconds, then FLARED to at least -10 magnitude for about 1 second. Then the satellite faded, almost to the limit of visibility (about +4 mag from our urban area). Then the cycle approximately repeated itself - got brighter for awhile, faded, then flared AGAIN to about -8 mag. This repeated another full cycle with another -8 flare as the satellite headed far to the north. For the record, coordinates were -- Newark, CA USA 37.554056,-122.03668 Alt 6M PDT (UTC -7) I know this report is not particularly scientific, and I've never really reported PPAS format. However, if nothing else, this has been one of the most SPECTACULAR flaring satellites I have ever seen in my observing career - definitely worth a look on ANY scheduled pass! I will try to get a good video of the pass tonight. If successful, I will post a link to the video file. Rick Baldridge Campbell, CA USA -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/private/seesat-l/attachments/20130706/63f1736a/attachment.html _______________________________________________ Seesat-l mailing list http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/listinfo/seesat-l
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