FLARE of Iridium 97- 30 B = 27837

Kurt Jonckheere (kjonckheere@unicall.be)
Sun, 7 Sep 1997 15:49:53 +0200

Yesterday I wrote :
>97- 30 C 97-09-05 20:22:47.3 KJ                       flare to mag -5
>                 Sat    Sat     Sun    Flare   Obs    Sun Phase   NORAD #
>   UT            Dir  AZ  EL   AZ  EL   Dur  Mag       
>20:22:47 09/05/97  S  077 46    ?   ?   10    -5   KJ    50       24838
>max EL was 46

In the evening (of Sep 6, '97) , I again saw some Iridia, 
some of them brightened to mag +4, some were Steady.  

Only the 97- 30 B = 24837 made it to -1.
24837 made an exactly similar pass as 24838 the day before, 
it also flared at maximum elevation.

                 Sat    Sat     Sun    Flare   Obs    Sun Phase   NORAD #
   UT            Dir  AZ  EL   AZ  EL   Dur  Mag       
20:16:24 09/06/97  S  077 46    ?   ?    8    -1   KJ    49       24837
max EL of pass was 46

First it brightened to mag+2 at 
20h15m56s  +2
it stayed about 20 seconds at +2 and started finally flaring to 
20h16m24s  -1
after this becoming fainter much faster :
20h16m34s  +3

observing place was : 51.2344 N, 4.2656 E, O m ASL

Happy observing,

Kurt J