-----Original Message----- From: Ralph McConahy <rmcconahy@earthlink.net> >23488 (94-85M) is a piece of debris from a Russian SL-19 rocket booster that >was launched 12/26/94. By the large number of debris pieces (25 in all) it >appears that there was a problem (explosion?) with the launch vehicle once >in orbit. On another note, the radar cross section of this object is only >0.47 m^2 which begs the question if that is what you truly saw or was it >something else? > >To answer you question about a way you can figure out what a given object >is, go to the web page: >ftp://tie.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/dransom/sat.sit.report/ssr99/ >and download the latest zip file. > There are many fragments (and even satellites) whose RCS varies considerably from month to month. A sheet of metal, or even non-metallic, can produce a very small RCS most of the time, but a better average optical CS (OCS?), and at least give good flashes. I believe there is a Ariane (Spot?) BJ fragment with a very good visibility (I've seen it) Bjoern Gimle