Steve, It's been a few years now but I also observed an extremely bright object that I could not find in the Heaven's Above (HA) database. Our circumstances were also similar; I was unprepared for properly recording the observation, and in my case, very inexperienced. My observation occurred around the middle of December 2007 here in North Central Colorado (N40.27941 W105.35824 ele: 2000m -7 UTC) and within an hour either side of 8:00 PM MST. I observed a slow moving and extremely bright satellite like object coming out of the West and setting to the East after reaching a peak elevation of ~70 degrees to the North. A few weeks earlier I had observed the ISS and this object appeared both brighter (steady, not a flare) and slower moving. Much later that night I was surprised to learn that neither the ISS nor another candidate in HA matched my observation details. Steve, I can confirm your sighting but I have no idea what it is. Best regards, Chris -----Original Message----- From: seesat-l-bounces+mtnresearch=gmail.com@satobs.org [mailto:seesat-l-bounces+mtnresearch=gmail.com@satobs.org] On Behalf Of Steve Newcomb Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 6:35 PM To: SeeSat-L@satobs.org Subject: Bright unknown I went outside to walk the dog with no watch expecting clouds but had a clear sky. Time is approximate 23.48.00 UTC February 23. From the northeast a bright, -3 magnitude, satellite was observed. I watched it travel across the sky a steady brightness getting a maximum elevation of about 60 degrees. It faded to 2 mag before passing less than a degree right of Jupiter. It was so bright that I was sure I would quickly identify using Heavens Above. I wish I had made note of more positions even without a watch. The time could be off plus/minus 5 minutes. Can anyone guess what I saw? Lat 39.4707 Lon -79.3388 Alt. 2590 ft. -5 UTC _______________________________________________ Seesat-l mailing list http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/listinfo/seesat-l _______________________________________________ Seesat-l mailing list http://mailman.satobs.org/mailman/listinfo/seesat-l
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Feb 24 2011 - 08:32:13 UTC