hi all I was in Merrionette Park ( 41.6840°N, 87.7000°W) Illinois last friday evening 17 march 2006 CDT celebrating st. pat's. I went outside to watch (according to HA's prediction) a -0 mag flare of iridium 18, followed about a minute later by a -8th mag flare off of iridium 38. as I exited the bar with a small group (who were all I could muster from the throng inside), we witnessed an amazing fireball in the SSE at approximately 17:30 CDT, green in color, reminding me of a leonid, duration was probably 3 seconds with a lot of variation in brightness and sparks, with a wicked terminal flash. luckily for me, because iridium 18 showed up as predicted but the star of the show, the -8th flare of iridium 38, never occurred. I just looked at nasa j-track 3d and it seems from that software that iridiums 18 and 38 are just about on opposite sides of the planet from each other. has iridium 38 been on the move recently, and mr. peat just hadn't updated HA? I sure hate to blow a prediction of a -8th magnitude flare in front of a group of mostly strangers. as the bartender, nicky called me, "a *$^&kin idiot," although he'd just witnessed an amazing fireball and a slow -0 mag flare of iridium 18 within the span of about 90 seconds... please see the link I am providing to the predictions for that evening: http://www.heavens-above.com/iridium.asp?lat=41.684&lng=-87.700&alt=188&loc=Merrionette+Park&TZ=CST&Date=38790.926712963&Dur=7 normally when i blow these predictions, there was only one event and people get a good laugh at me. thank heavens (no pun intended) iridium 18 showed up, as did that bolide. stephan szyman chicago IL USA 41.9630N, 87.7561W; 188 msl ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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