I'm sorry to hear that the weather for Bram and others was so unfavorable. Ours hasn't been too good here this winter, but we just had a very nice Tuesday evening (local time). I was able to see several flaring geosats with my handheld 8x42 binoculars, and with Mike's 8-inch (20 cm) telescope, we saw at least eleven more. And we stopped at about 11:00 PM local time. The action was roughly in the vicinity of RA 10:50-11:00, Dec -5.0, where they were nearing their entry into the Earth's shadow. I didn't try to see the few farther west that also flare at the "wrong time", about three hours early. One aspect of this phenomenon that's a bit tricky is that the conditions are most favorable when the observer is close to the Earth's limb, as seen from the vantage point of the satellite. That's either early in the evening or late in the morning from here, when the satellites low in east (or west in the morning, though I've never tried to see those yet) are nearing eclipse. I guess it's pretty much all night long from high latitudes. The photo that John Locker recently pointed out helps to visualize this aspect of it: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/Mar-2004/0057.html An observer near the limb of the Earth is as close as possible to the "perfect" alignment of Sun, satellite, and observer. Someone on the equator at midnight on the equinox is at the least favorable position. Ed Cannon - ecannon@mail.utexas.edu - Austin, Texas, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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