Nimbus 7 flare

Edward S Light (light@argoscomp.com)
Tue, 6 Oct 1998 08:21:50 -0400 (EDT)

Yesterday evening in a hazy-cloudy full-moon-lit sky, we saw a spectacular
Iridium-like flare from Nimbus 7 (11080 = 78-098A). We had watched it pass
to the right (West) of Sagitta, noting, in binoculars, that it was as bright
as epsilon Sge (V=5.67) when in a very few seconds, at about 1998 Oct 05
23:35.2 UTC, it brightened to about magnitude -1 (i.e. brighter than Vega's
+0.03, much fainter then Jupiter's -2.9). Has anyone seen this flaring before? 
(The only other time we'd seen this objects was 1998 Jan 11/00:01 UTC at an
apparent mag of about +5.2 with no hint of flaring.)

Quicksat output (edited) for this pass ...

  40.107  74.232   69.   Light House, Lakewood NJ 1999  9.5 10 F T T T T
***  1998 Oct   5  Mon evening  *** Times are PM EDT  ***  1921  6 9 (981005)
 H  M  S  Tim Al Azi C Dir  Mag Dys F  Hgt Shd  Rng  EW Phs  RA 99 Dec

11080 Nimbus 7       3.0 2.0     5.4 4.6   4.5 <** ( 1) 4.8 B*
 7 34 48   .0 73 177   163  5.1   1 8  595 492  620 1.5  75 1940  22.5
 7 35  8   .0 65 183   167  5.2   1 8  595 494  648 1.4  77 1931  14.9
 7 35 27   .0 58 186   169  5.4   1 8  595 497  685 1.4  79 1925   8.0


Clear and dark skies!
   Ed Light

Lakewood, NJ, USA
N 40.1072, W 074.2317, Hgt +21 m (69 ft)