The pair of DMSP F18 and the Centaur upper stage passed here half an hour ago essentially as predicted by Ted's elements (good job, Ted!) except that they came about 11 seconds early. I took the times (UTC, 18-OCT-09) for passing below Beta And and just above Gamma Per: Beta And: 17:34:23.8 (Centaur), 17:34:25.3 (DMSP) Gamma Per: 17:35:51.7 (Centaur), 17:35:53.7 (DMSP) The leading object (Centaur) was about as bright as Beta And, which means mag 2 and the trailing object was weaker at about mag 5. There was a ring-like halo surrounding the Centaur and it seemed to expand in size during the pass. I didn't observe any halo around other stars so it must have been something from the Centaur. Looking forward to the next pass. Gerhard HOLTKAMP Darmstadt, Germany 49.8822N, 8.6558E ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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