Re: IRIDIUM Flare?
Mike DiMuzio (mdimuzio@cisnet.com)
Wed, 14 Jul 1999 03:17:51 +0000
Karsten Isenberg wrote:
>
> Hi!
>
> I live for a while in Stillwater, OK.
> At 12th July 1999, I was out to a lake - called Boomer Lake. The sun was
> in the west above the horizon and behind some clouds.
>
> At 20:06, I saw a flashing light in the SW. It looked like a
> disappearing iridium flare with a magnitude of -6 or -7.
> I had no coordinates and predictions of flares for that location.
> Usually, I look at GSOC's prediction service for satellite passes for
> the address of my apartment.
>
> So, I looked into the TIGER map to get the coordinates for the site at
> the Boomer Lake.
> I found out that I was at: Lat: 36.1460228 Lon: -97.0618057
> Then I looked into GSOC's "Iridium flares over the past 48 hours". But
> there is no listing for 20:06h.
>
> Unfortunately, I stay in the US only for five month as an visitor
> student from germany. So I can only use computers in a University
> Computer Lab. To install extra software is not possible and a satellite
> prediction program is not included in the "big" choice of software. So,
> I'm not able to look for a satellite, which was at that time at that
> position.
>
> May can one of you tell me what I saw?
>
> - Karsten -
I don't think it was a flare. The nearest occurred at 20:23 CDT, a -6.8 flare
from Iridium 10. Of course I'm assuming that the time you gave was CDT.
Since only tumbling Iridiums flash, you may have seen a weather balloon
or a reflection off an aircraft.
Mike
--
41.087N 80.714W 305 meters
Mike DiMuzio mdimuzio@cisnet.com