HST exposes flashing geosynch

Ed Cannon (ecannon@mail.utexas.edu)
Tue, 20 Apr 1999 03:39:14 -0500

Mike McCants and I were at the BCRC site (30.314N, 97.866W, 
280m) Monday evening.  There were some scattered high, thin 
clouds that grew more widespread as the evening progressed, 
but it was good enough to be there for a while.  

I was watching a good one-power pass of HST, when there was 
a solid +2 or perhaps brighter flash a couple of degrees 
below (SW) of it!  Mike said, "Where was it?"  I did the 
best I could with my limited knowledge of the sky to tell 
him and meanwhile kept watching the spot.  After what 
turned out to be almost 3 minutes, there was another 
one-power flash.  Mike saw the third one in his finder scope 
and after that was able to get a good position and flash 
period (172.74 seconds) before it grew to faint to see with 
his 8-inch scope.  Using Findsat.exe and geo.tle, only one 
candidate appeared:  ASC 1, (15994, 85-76C).  The first 
flash that I saw, SSW of HST, was at about 02:19 on Tuesday, 
20 April UTC; the last one that I could see in Mike's 12x80 
finder scope was about 25 minutes later.  Mike observed a 
couple more using the 8-inch scope.  (I'm sure that if I've 
missed on this ID that Mike will correct it.)

Jay Respler reported irregular variation from 85-76C in 1995:

] 85- 76 C 95-08-20 05:55 ... JHR ... I 27-86s, mag 10->13

Later while we were visually plotting two bright meteors, I 
saw another bright one-power flash!  While trying to tell 
Mike where that one was, there was another flash which he 
saw also, and it was not very many seconds after the first 
one.  Then it hit me that it was around 10:40 p.m. local -- 
time for Superbird A flashes!

Ed Cannon - ecannon@mail.utexas.edu - Austin, Texas, USA