Michael McCants wrote:
>> The original nominal node for the Milstar 4 Centaur was 301, but it
>> was late launching, so a lower value would be expected.
Of course this is backwards. A later launch means that the Earth
has rotated farther east and that means a higher node value.
(The below elset does indeed have a node that is about 30 degrees
higher than the original Centaur target node.)
Rick Baldridge wrote:
>Mike's elements above put the satellite a bit too far west (about 1.5
>degrees) relative to tonight's observations, so a slight change to the
I must have made a mistake. You said you were at 121 degrees east
longitude? No, maybe using west longitude would make a difference. :-(
Let's try again:
Unknown 010313
1 90009U 01572A 01074.70789176 0.00000000 00000-0 +00000+0 0 02
2 90009 2.9000 327.5003 0001000 0.0523 359.9743 1.00263524 05
>sketchy as of yet. Satellite still passes about 1/8th degree EAST of DBS-2
>heading south, but a bit earlier (6 - 7 minutes) each night, near 4:54 U.T.
>at present.
We looked for a while last night, but it would seem that we were looking
in the wrong place.
We had been distracted by 5th magnitude flashes from what turned out to
be Molniya 3-27 at a range of 20000 miles. (Ed first discovered it
in July, 1998.) Then we were distracted by all of the objects
up there next to DBS 2. Here are predictions for us for tonight
to give you an idea of what is there.
30.3138 97.8661 900. Bee Caves Rsrch Ctr
*** 2001 Mar 17 Fri evening *** Times are UT ***
90009 Unknown 010313
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22245 55 186 5 0 9 54.7 -5.1 22875
22245 54 186 5 10 10 4.7 -5.2 22880
23192 DBS 2
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22246 55 186 5 0 9 54.5 -5.0 22874
22246 55 186 5 10 10 4.6 -5.0 22874
23598 DBS 3
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22246 55 186 5 0 9 54.2 -5.0 22874
22246 55 186 5 10 10 4.2 -5.0 22874
23553 AMSC-1
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22247 55 186 5 0 9 53.7 -5.0 22875
22247 55 186 5 10 10 3.7 -5.0 22875
25954 99060A GE 4
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22245 55 186 5 0 9 53.0 -5.0 22874
22245 55 186 5 10 10 3.1 -5.0 22874
25937 99056A DIRECTV 1-R
HGT ALT AZI HRS MIN R A DEC RANGE
22243 55 187 5 0 9 52.4 -5.0 22871
22243 55 187 5 10 10 2.5 -5.0 22871
The two "leading" objects, DBS 2 and 3, (as the stars go by them)
were about magnitude 8.5 at 4:30 and were visible in my 80mm finder scope
with a 16mm eyepiece (to give about 20x). We watched from about 3:45
until about 4:30, but we did not see an object near DBS 2. But of course
we gave up too soon.
We saw 3 other objects after DBS 2 and 3, but the spacing does not seem
to match the above predictions precisely. Magnitudes were between
10 and 12. This was with my 8 inch telescope at 85X under clear, dark,
slightly light-polluted skies.
Mike McCants
Austin. TX
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Mar 16 2001 - 14:54:39 PST