Re: geosat occultation

From: Mike McCants (mmccants@io.com)
Date: Wed Oct 03 2007 - 18:19:07 EDT

  • Next message: Kevin Fetter: "can spot one of the Intelsat's flaring up."

    Bob Hampton posted:
    
    >Monday night (Tue AM, 10/02/2007 about 04:00 UTC) I was watching
    >a group of three geosats I often observe.  They are all 3 visible at once
    
    The three appear to be Galaxy 11 (26038, 99-71A), Nimiq 1 (25740, 99-27A)
    and DBS 1 (22930, 93-78A).
    
    Nimiq 1 and DBS 1 are close together.  Galaxy 11 is about 0.1 degrees away.
    
    >was very obvious but B and C were not visible at all.  Over the next hour
    >B and C slowly brightened into view (something else I've never seen
    
    It's time for "flaring geosyncs".  :-)
    
    Ed was able to spot GE 1 (24315, 96-54A) naked eye (mag 4) about 03:05 UT
    (45 degrees from shadow entry?) and Echostar 3 (25004, 97-59A) naked eye
    (mag 3) about 03:13 UT last night (just before shadow entry). (Oct 3 UT)
    
    We saw 14 geosyncs last night.  One of the most interesting was Brazilsat B1
    (23199, 94-49A).  It was rapidly varying from about magnitude 8 to magnitude 10.
    The period was about 2 seconds.  This was just before shadow entry at 04:20 UT.
    This has been seen in the past and it is "normal" for the Brazilsats.
    
    Anik F1 (26644, 00-76A) and Anik F1-R (28868, 05-36A) are right next to each
    other.  From past history, Anik F1 should be brighter.  I suspect that the
    tles for these two objects got reversed when they first came close together.
    
    When GE 1 was seen very bright the night before last (Oct 2 UT), Spaceway 1
    was seen at mag 12 and DirectTV 10 was seen at mag 12.5 right next to it.
    
    Observations from BCRC (30.3N, 97.9W).
    
    Mike McCants
    Austin, TX
    
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