Sorry for late notice but maybe still soon enough for someone unaware to see something. Another Minuteman II launch from Vandenberg Tues. (Jan. 18) at 6:01 PM PST (0200 UTC) launch window extending until 10 PM PST. Comparing to the spectacular Oct. 2, 1999 Minuteman II launch which happened about 15 min. after sunset with clear weather all around, this time if it launches at the beginning of the window, the sun will already have been set for about 50 min. So if the display benefits from the twilight efffect at all, I surmise it won't catch any sunrays until the missile reaches very high altitude. The Oct. 2 one did have a steep and high trajectory, one report saying it went up to 900 miles into space. I assume this one will have the same trajectory. Another factor this time is that there are clouds around but the clouds are not so thick as to make it totally hopeless from what I see at my location. See for more details: http://mocc.vafb.af.mil/launchsched.asp -- Jake Rees Burbank, California ----------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe from SeeSat-L by sending a message with 'unsubscribe' in the SUBJECT to SeeSat-L-request@lists.satellite.eu.org http://www2.satellite.eu.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Jan 18 2000 - 16:57:13 PST