In a message dated 11/16/99 9:54:32 PM, ROBERT.D.MATSON@saic.comwrites: >> At 7:05 pm eastern, I saw a VERY bright fireball of some >> sort pass from west to east. I estimate when I first saw it, it was about >> 40 degrees up in the northwest (I was looking for MIR). It passed due north >> of me at about 30 degrees and "set" in the northeast. It was EXTREMELY >> bright, fluctuated in brightness and had a very bright and long tail. >> Was this a Leonid or a satellite decay? > >Probably neither. Unless the object was visible for more than >30 seconds, it was a meteor. A group of us northwest of Washington, DC saw the same thing that Darwin saw, only by the time it reached us, it had clearly broken up into 3 distinct pieces, separated by perhaps 10 degrees apart. They were clearly trailing flames, moving slowly, perhaps 15 degrees above the horizon, from NW to NE. I didn't think to look at my watch (we were directing traffic for a stargazing program), but my sense was that it was between 7:05 PM and 7:10 PM, probably closer to 7:05. The direction eliminated it as a possible Leonid, since it was heading towards the NE, not out of the NE. So it had to be either a fireball breaking up or a reentry. I'd never seen anything quite like it before. Jim Cook Germantown MD 39.2N, 77.3W ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html