Gorizonts 17 and 23 and 98001
Ed Cannon (ecannon@mail.utexas.edu)
Mon, 15 Mar 1999 02:50:09 -0600
Sunday evening (early 15 March UTC), Mike McCants and I observed
Gorizonts 17 (19765, 89-4A) and 23 (21533, 91-46A). Gorizont
17's flashes brightened somewhat as we observed it but did not
get brighter than about +9 during that time. Its period was
about 83 seconds, although it was also visible at the half-period
(i.e., there were one quick flash and one long tumble for each
period). Some of Gorizont 23's flashes were about +6, with a
period of just over 50 seconds.
GORIZONT 17
1 19765U 89004A 99069.84613366 -.00000189 +00000-0 +10000-3 0 01499
2 19765 006.4225 053.7778 0020891 257.1795 102.7225 00.99065490036901
GORIZONT 23
1 21533U 91046A 99068.84779718 -.00000213 00000-0 10000-3 0 1271
2 21533 4.4702 65.2258 0005064 94.2432 266.0556 0.98908651 22202
Later Mike pointed the telescope right at 98001, which we
observed for a few minutes as it was fading. Both of us thought
that we *might* have seen a very faint object in the vicinity of
98001, but they may have been star twinkles, since 98001 is low
in the sky from here (location was BCRC, Austin, Texas: 30.314N,
97.866W, 280 m).
I looked for one-power flashes from Telstar 401 but did not see
any. (I find it really hard to try to observe one spot in the
sky with my hand-held binoculars for four minutes!) I also
looked for one-power flashes from Superbird A but didn't see
any. However, it was pretty low in our sky and also I wasn't
100% sure when to look.
Ed Cannon - ecannon@mail.utexas.edu - Austin, Texas, USA