Sometimes a possible visual obs happen by chance and last night was one of those cases. My better half Gayle and I were out enjoying the comet Hale Bopp show in our great location (sw North carolina mountains -- no city light pollution). While see was admiring HB in the 10 x 50s, I was casually looking around other sections of the sky. Report follows: Date/time: 3/27/97 at 0053 UTC (3/26/97 at 1953 EST) Observer Location: 35 deg 02' 46.3"N/83 deg 56' 28"W at 502 meters alt Location: About one degree south of Beta Taurus (El Nath). Apparent Magnitude: 0 or more Narrative: I saw this object brighten very suddenly (yellow-gold color) about 1 degree south of Beta Taurus. It looked nearly round and was as bright or brighter than Venus. It appeared to me to be moving in a southerly direction . I only saw it for about a second or so and it appeared to only move about 1/2 degree across the sky, then it was gone. I have done a lot of night sky observing over my Navy years (not much else to do when you are at sea). In my nearly 25 years of night sky obs, I have never seen this before. So to you experts here on Seesat: could this be a glint that I have seen mentioned here from a orbiting object? If so, it would be my first and I find that exciting. Any help on this one would be appreciated. Best Regards to all, Larry Van Horn Managing Editor Satellite Times magazine "Satellite Times Magazine - We cover space from LEO to GEO and beyond." E-mail address: steditor@grove.net; Home Page: http://www.grove.net/hmpgst.html Telephone: 704-837-9200; Fax: 704-837-2216 (Brasstown, NC) Personal home page-Utility World: http://www.grove.net/~larry/uteworld.html