USA 129 Obs

Bryan Dort (bdort@freeway.net)
Tue, 8 Apr 1997 22:29:49 -0400

I finally had a chance to see USA 129!

It made a great pass just under Benetansch. I'm still new at this, but I
am estimating the mag at 4.0.  (I am estimating the mag at the same mag as
the last star in the constellation Bootes that was directly under
Benetansch.) 

It was right on with the latest Molczan elset:

USA 129         15.0  3.0  0.0  5.1 v
1 24680U 96072  A 97 81.15398120  .00010426  00000-0  11932-3 0    03
2 24680  97.8549 144.9488 0538021 228.3204 126.7146 14.73648138    04

and Quicksat produced:

  45.052  83.458  200.   Alpena MI USA            2000  8.0 30 F F T T T

***  1997 Apr   8  Tue evening  *** Times are PM EDT  ***  21 3  6 7

 H  M  S  Tim Al Azi C Dir  Mag Dys F  Hgt Shd  Rng  EW Phs  R A   Dec
24680 USA 129                            c
22  5 25   .6 38 112   302 20.8  18 7  548  37  818  .8  20 1256  12.8
22  6 55   .6 47  72 C 270 20.6  18 7  529 170  694 1.0  49 1345  41.2
22  8 24   .6 37  31   238 21.3  18 7  510 273  770  .9  80 1614  66.0

I was not wearing an accurate watch because I ran out of the house when I
saw that the sky was clear and USA 129 was almost at culmination.  I
picked it up just after that with a pair of 10 x 50 binoculars and
followed to about 30 degrees.  I was a little distracted by my 2-year-old
so I'm sorry that I can't give accurate times.  As far as I could tell,
the time was right on the money to what Quicksat produced.  

This was alot of fun to see considering the talk about it last Dec-Jan.

Good viewing,
Bryan
--
Bryan Dort - bdort@agh.org
Programmer Analyst
Alpena General Hospital - http://www.agh.org
Alpena, MI  USA
45.0524N 83.4575W 200m