June 2007 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

Re: Shuttle sighting opportunities
by Kurt Fisher 16 Jun '07

16 Jun '07

Watched the 11:46pm-11:50pm local time 6/15 overpass. No flares. Just a pretty even deep orange color. This overpass was at 31deg alt, a relatively higher angle than the 20-21 deg overpasses that produced apparent flaring. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Wolf Creek Pass - warm?
by Quinn Jensen 16 Jun '07

16 Jun '07

Wolf Creek was a lot warmer last night than I expected. The slight breeze wasn't the expected biting cold, but a rather pleasant, lukewarm relief from the valley heat. Just enough breeze to keep the skeeters at bay, but not enough to interfere with observing. Seeing was excellent, but the transparency was a bit limited by haze, especially near the horizon. Overall, it was wonderful. With today's heat and dryness, tonight might be another winner up there! Oh, and virtually all of the snow is gone, and the roads are almost 100% dry and dusty. Best regards, Quinn

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Shuttle sighting opportunities
by Kurt Fisher 16 Jun '07

16 Jun '07

Saw the 00:24 overpass from the Aves. It was visible from about az 330 to az 10. Unlike the prior night, this one had a light anomaly. As it was darkening, there as an brief 1-2 second brightening from 2.5 to 1.0. My guess is the bright shuttle body caught the light at the right angle. - Kurt P.S. Happy travels to club members on their way to Bryce. _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: Shuttle sighting opportunities
by Kurt Fisher 15 Jun '07

15 Jun '07

Patrick wrote: > Same thing happened tonight as seen from here near SPOC except > the momentary brightening was even more dramatic, brightening > for a few seconds to nearly as bright as Venus. I wonder if the > phenomena is somehow related to the newly installed solar arrays. > I've seen several shuttle/station passes over the years but > I've never seen "irridium-flare-like" brightenings like these. I also saw one of these bright flare-ups, nearly the brightness of Venus, during last night's 11:30 pm local time overpass. It's a hot topic on the www.spaceweather.com . The June 14 www.spaceweather.com features an imaging sequence of an ISS overpass on June 11, including this amazing photograph: http://spaceweather.com/swpod2007/14jun06/Storey1.jpg IMHO, the shuttle seems to be the reflecting surface, not the panels. Storey's image was taken with a 6 inch f/8. I've been mulling about how to take such a sequence. I am thinking that the best passes are those like last night - where the appearing and ending altitude do not change much - like 6/14 11:30pm - or where the appearing and disappearing azimuth do not change much - like 6/14 00:42. Then you would only have to track on one axis. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Salt Lake Tribune article about Astronomy Festival
by Ann House 14 Jun '07

14 Jun '07

http://www.sltrib.com/search//ci_6132462

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Shuttle sighting opportunities
by Kurt Fisher 13 Jun '07

13 Jun '07

More shuttle sighting opportunities: ================= NASA ISS Thu Jun 14/00:42 AM < 1 13 10 above NW 13 above NW Cal Sky Accurate time: 0h43m16s Appears 0h40m45s 3.9m az:308.5d NW Disappears 0h43m16s 2.3m az:315.3d NW h:13.9d ================= NASA ISS Thu Jun 14/11:30 PM 1 21 19 above N 21 above NE Cal Sky Accurate time: 23h30m53s Appears 23h26m17s 5.1m az:313.2d NW Transit 23h30m53s 1.1m az: 24.3d NNE h:21.9d dist:809.7km alt:344.9km Disappears 23h31m15s 0.9m az: 36.4d NE h:21.3d ================== NASA ISS Fri Jun 15/10:15 PM 2 12 12 above N 10 above NE ================== NASA ISS Fri Jun 15/11:50 PM < 1 30 24 above NNW 30 above NNW CalSky Accurate time: 23h50m26s Appears 23h46m34s 4.6m az:309.3d NW Disappears 23h50m26s 0.9m az:336.3d NNW h:31.9d ================== ISS Sat Jun 16/10:35 PM 3 20 17 above N 13 above ENE CalSky Accurate time: 22h35m14s Appears 22h30m42s 5.8m az:313.6d NW Transit 22h35m14s 0.6m az: 22.9d NNE h:19.8d dist:863.3km alt:343.1km Disappears 22h37m06s 0.5m az: 68.9d ENE h:11.9d Time uncertainty of about 9 seconds ================== ISS Sun Jun 17/00:09 AM < 1 16 10 above WNW 16 above WNW CalSky Accurate time: 0h09m37s Appears 0h06m53s 4.0m az:302.2d WNW Disappears 0h09m37s 1.7m az:293.0d WNW h:15.8d ================== ISS Sun Jun 17/10:56 PM 2 43 29 above NNW 35 above ENE CalSky Accurate time: 22h55m28s Appears 22h50m40s 5.1m az:310.2d NW Transit 22h55m28s -0.9m az: 31.3d NNE h:41.5d dist:499.5km alt:342.3km Disappears 22h56m04s -1.1m az: 66.8d ENE h:35.4d Time uncertainty of about 12 seconds - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Mr. Wizard died today
by Patrick Wiggins 12 Jun '07

12 Jun '07

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19196808/ pw

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My Ride in the Harmons MS 150 Bike Tour
by John R. Peterson 12 Jun '07

12 Jun '07

Once again, I'm riding in the MS 150 Bike Tour up in Logan on June 23 and 24. If you're interested in donating as little (or as much) as you want, you can do it online. Start at this site: http://bikeutu.nationalmssociety.org/site/PageServer?pagename=BIKE_UTU_home… Then click on the "Donate/ePledge at the top of the page. Then go to "Riders 2007", and click on "search for participants" and put in my first and last names. I'm the first "John Peterson" from Team RHSM riders (it's true, in spite of being a hard-core public school teacher and supporter, I ride with the Rowland Hall team). Then just follow the directions. Thanks for your support! John R. Peterson

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Fun satellite & shuttle update
by Patrick Wiggins 12 Jun '07

12 Jun '07

I just came in from watching my favorite non-human carrying Earth orbiting spacecraft. It was orbited by the Japanese several years ago and is called EGP (I think that stands for Experimental Geodetic Payload). Basically it's a 2 meter diameter sphere covered with mirrors. Kind of like the Starshine satellites a number of us helped polish mirrors for a few years back but on a much larger scale. It's fun to watch in that as it passes across the sky the Sun glints off of the mirrors causing a couple of ~3.5 magnitude flashes per second. Makes me think of a diamond flashing across the sky. As it happens this is a good week for northern Utahans to do a bit of EGP watching. Those wanting to know the wheres and what times came go to: http://www.heavens-above.com/selectsat.asp? lat=40.761&lng=-111.890&loc=Salt+Lake+City&alt=0&tz=MST and enter 16908 for the "US Space Command ID". On the next page click on "Ajisai (EGP)" and on the page after that click on "Passes". FWIW, I would not bother with any passes with Max Altitudes under 50 to 60 degrees. Also, if you've got eyes as old as mine, binoculars help (I used 7x35s). As for Atlantis, now that the mission has been extended 2 days we could have an excellent view next Wednesday (the 20th) night. Details here: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/cities/region.cgi? country=United_States&region=Utah pw

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Shuttle sighting opportunities
by Kurt Fisher 11 Jun '07

11 Jun '07

Patrick wrote: > Saw the same color both passes tonight. > Suspect it might come from ISS's solar arrays. > But it might just have been because the craft were > so low in the sky (11 degrees and 15 degrees). The white to golden-orange - fading to red - transition of colors IMHO seem to relate to the altitude of the ISS above the Earth and the degrees from the terminator. Close to the terminator and high gives a brillant white color; further from the terminator and high (like last night) yields golden-orange; far from the terminator fades to red and then black. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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