Iridium 11, Meteor 1-2 r, USA 81, and Early Bird

Jason E Felton (Mir16609@aol.com)
Mon, 1 Jun 1998 23:49:39 EDT

Hello everyone.

Iridium 11 passed at an 80 deg elevation this evening at 21:11 EDT (01:11 UT).
There was too much ambient light to get a fix on it for its entire pass but I
did see about 2 or 3 negative magnitude flashes in the brief period when it
was passing over Arcturus.  There are other passes this week where the
lighting conditions should be better. 

Meteor 1-2 r (04120, 69084B) flashed several times as it was passing under
Vega at 22:06 EDT (02:06 UT).  The flashes were spaced 10-15 seconds apart and
reached a -1 magnitude.  The flashes appeared to be reddish-brown in color.  

I've observed this in the past but it bears repeating: somtimes USA 81
twinkles at 1x during a good pass.  Tonight it was probably no brighter than
+2.0 mag at 22:21 EDT (02:21 UT) as it passed through Hercules, but the light
that was reflecting from it was by no means smooth and steady.  

I am reporting the observation of Early Bird (25123, 97085A) simply because I
have been waiting since it was launched last December for a decent visible
pass.  *$#! sun-synchronous orbits!   With most of the haze taking a vacation
I was able to observe it between beta and gamma-Cep at 23:09:20 EDT (03:09:20
UT), about a 6.5 mag. 

One last note:  I made one obsevation on the evening of 31 May: Iridium 10
flared to a -5 mag at 21:08:56 EDT (01:08:56 UT).   The overcast skies totally
obscured both Vega and Arcturus.  Only the Moon was visible but it was
extremely dim.  The light from the flare easily punched through the clouds.

Cheers.
Don Gardner
Homepage: http://members.aol.com/mir16609/
76.8419 W, 39.1796 N,  34m ASL