Re: Bright unid flasher

From: Michael R Thompson via Seesat-l <seesat-l_at_satobs.org>
Date: Tue, 14 Jul 2020 06:41:15 +0000
First thing I typically look for with a bright, obvious UNID is an object space-track has lost track of for at least a handful of days.

A lot of times I have luck with highly eccentric rocket bodies that are decaying pretty quickly.  Looking now at 45808, the rocket body from the last Beidou launch with a perigee well below 200km that hasn't had a TLE update in nearly 12 days.  The apogee is on the side of the Earth away from the Sun, so it'd be visible at night, but slow-moving.

Any info on how quickly it was moving or generally what part of the sky it was in?

Thanks,
Michael
________________________________
From: Seesat-l <seesat-l-bounces+thomp376=purdue.edu_at_satobs.org> on behalf of Jonathan McDowell via Seesat-l <seesat-l_at_satobs.org>
Sent: Tuesday, July 14, 2020 1:15 AM
To: seesat-l_at_satobs.org <seesat-l_at_satobs.org>
Subject: Bright unid flasher

I've had a number of people (mostly experienced observers) contact me over
the past two weeks reporting a very bright flaring satellite not matched by
obvious searches on heavens-above:
Jason Major:    0335 UTC Jul 14, Rhode Island
Casey Crandall: 1015 UTC Jul 9, Ogden, UT
Mark Marley:    1145 UTC Jul 9, San Francisco area
Ron Dantowitz:  0536 UTC Jul 10, Brookline, MA
Seems plausible the reports are related. Just random flaring Starlinks
or something else? Any ideas?
Some details attached.
  - Jonathan
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Received on Tue Jul 14 2020 - 01:42:26 UTC

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