Unknown object observed by Ed Cannon

From: Mike McCants (mmccants@io.com)
Date: Fri Oct 17 2003 - 15:04:44 EDT

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    Ed Cannon sent me the following this morning.  He was looking for flaring
    geosyncs and noticed this object passing through one of his reference
    star fields.  There was no match with any known object.
    
    He was at the E. Ney Museumm grounds, 30.307N, 97.727W, 150m.
    
    >I didn't come up with anything for the following,
    >which went through a known area (21:18, -5).  It was
    >about +6 and steady.
    >
    >2003-10-17 UTC (2000 coordinates)
    >1:00:37.6  21:18:00 -4.75
    >1:00:44.7  21:21:00 -4.35
    >1:00:59.0  21:26:00 -3.90
    >1:02:49.3  22:05:00  0.0
    >1:03:44.2  22:24:30  1.8
    
    I tried to fit orbits through these points and I came up with the
    following series of elsets:
    
    1 99991U          03290.03331171  .00400000  00000-0  41417-4 0    08
    2 99991  28.9100 271.2700 1880000 223.5000 136.5000 12.77000000    09
    
    1 99991U          03290.03389737  .00400000  00000-0  76777-4 0    06
    2 99991  28.3000 269.8700 1900000 233.5000 126.5000 12.79000000    00
    
    1 99991U          03290.03475617  .00400000  00000-0  39170-4 0    05
    2 99991  27.0000 266.6700 1970000 253.5000 106.5000 12.55000000    02
    
    1 99991U          03290.03519945  .00400000  00000-0  82700-4 0    05
    2 99991  26.0000 264.1200 2000000 273.5000  86.5000 11.82000000    02
    
    I assume this is a Centaur or Delta in a decaying orbit.
    
    It was about 1700 miles high in the southeast at a range of over
    2200 miles when Ed saw it.  Since the mean motion is so uncertain
    we will search for 2 hours tonight.
    
    Mike McCants
    Austin, TX
    
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