mir and progress
richard.keen@kingsmarket.com
Sun, 01 Feb 98 21:45:27
I Watched a pass of Mir followed by what I presume was the
Progress M-37 vehicle. First, the edited Quicksat output for
Mir:
39.877 105.391 8950. Coal Creek Canyon, CO 2000
1998 Feb 2 Mon UT 111 1319
H M S Tim Al AziC Dir Mag Dys F Hgt Shd Rng R A Dec Name
2 16 18 .0 32 302 73 -.4 3 3 241 32 428 2240 43.1 Mir
Mir was steady at magnitude 2 to 2.5 before fading into its
sunset. Just as Mir disappeared, I spotted the Progress at
magnitude +1, and rapidly faded to magnitude +7, and slowly
brightened to magnitude +4.5 before it, too, disappeared into the
earth's shadow. It followed Mir by about a minute, ormaybe a bit
less than a minute.
I apparently caught the Progress during a brief flash - does it
have solar panels? Or do I have the two objects out of order,
and the second object was Mir? If so, I'm amazed that it dimmed
to 7th magnitude!!!
Cheers, Rich Keen
Coal C