Hello...I just subscribed to the list and am probably committing a faux pas by posting before lurking for awhile to get a feel for the types of posts, but hey, the introduction letter said it would be appreciated if I gave a short note of introduction. My name is Lance Pickup and I'm a very novice satellite observer, meaning that I mainly do it for fun when the mood strikes. My first experience satellite hunting was probably about 20 years ago when as a teenager my aunt took me outside and told me that if I looked hard enough I could see satellites. Furthermore, as a kid I grew up on Satellite Circle in Olean, NY. I usually enjoy hunting satellites when I am camping. For that reason I have been interested in seeing more tracking programs for Palm Pilot type platforms, and until just recently I was disappointed not to find any. I will have to check out the one that I have recently seen. Anyway, what prompted me to go in search of satellite tracking groups/ info was about a month ago (it's been a long search :-) as I was camping with some friends, we were out on Ricker Pond, VT in a canoe admiring a very nice northern lights display when my friend (even more of an amateur than me) pointed out a formation of three sats flying almost directly overhead, travelling from north to south. I was astounded as I had never seen such a thing. I have discovered information on the NOSS trios, which appears to be the most reasonable explanation, however there are problems with that explanation, not the least of which is after doing a "prediction" search on that night of all 3 NOSS trios using Heavens Above, none of the passes seem to match up (is scanning back that far in time inherently inaccurate?) The closest match is a pass of NOSS 2-3 on 9/14 at 20:40:29 reaching a max elevation of 81 deg and mag 6.1, which is the brightest of all the passes, which is significant since the northern lights were still glowing somewhat decreasing visibility. But this pass was predicted about an hour and a half before my observation! The next predicted pass was only 20 minutes after my observation, but it only reached a max elevation of 17 degrees at a mag of 8.1. I was wondering if there are any other known trios of satellites out there that I should be researching? At any rate, it was a fantastic evening--one that I'll remember for quite some time. In case anyone is curious, my approximate location was at Lat: 44.233 Long: -72.233 and the local time was approximately 22:10 Eastern Daylight Time on 9/14/02 (my watch was not synchronized with anything). I'm looking forward to learning more about tracking satellites and am looking forward to actively tracking these trios in the future! ...Lance -- Lance Pickup O- VNET/IBM Internet: lpickup@btv SiGe Digital & Mixed Signal Internet: lpickup@vnet.ibm.com IBM Microelectronics ICQ UIN: 216830 Burlington, VT Phone: (802) 769-7104 (tie 446) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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