Iridium Glints to Mag -9

Jim Varney (sat_watcher@rocketmail.com)
Sun, 12 Oct 1997 11:09:52 -0700 (PDT)

My wife, daughter and I watched Iridium 13 glint up to an amazing mag
-9, drawing gasps from everyone.  This is the brightest object I have
ever seen in the sky -- other than the sun and moon, of course.

The glint occurred on Oct 12, 1997 at 0206 UT in twilight.  Skysat
listed a sun-mirror divergence of only 0.05 degrees.  Range was only
979 km.  51 deg above the horizon.  I assume that the max theoretical
brightness occurs when the divergence is 0 degrees and the range is
small.

The glint was much brighter than the two space shuttle reentries I
have seen, which tend to be estimated around mag -6 or -7.  From that
I put Iridium 13 at mag -9.

It was so bright that it did not look like a point source.  It looked
like an intense ball of bluish white light, with an apparent diameter
of maybe 10 minutes of arc.  Incredible.
__________________________________________________
Jim Varney   121.398W  38.458N 8m   Sacramento, CA
jamesv@softcom.net, sat_watcher@rocketmail.com

The following tagline is added against my wishes.



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