Hi Ken, > I have a question concerning a possible sighting of > cosmos 1220. I was out last night (2/19) and saw a > fairly bright object (2 to 2.5) going from north to > southeast. After doing some checking, it turns out > that cosmos 1220 was going along the same track at the > correct time. If culmination was around 18:46 EST, 35 degrees above the east-northeast, then Cosmos 1220 is a good match. > Heavens-above has the pass at 4.6 magnitude. SkyMap gives 4.1 -- still quite a bit dimmer than what you observed. There may be a specular component to the brightness, however, and the phase angle was quite good for this pass (within 20 degrees of full-phase at one point). > Is it possible that estimation for the satellite brightness was > that much off? Yes, since the standard magnitudes on which satellite brightness are based represent "average" values for a satellite having those dimensions. Best, Rob ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Feb 20 2001 - 16:34:10 PST