Europe's new weather satellite MetOp-B

On September 17, a Soyuz rocket launched from Baikonur brought Europe's newest weather satellite in an 805 x 810 km polar orbit: MetOp-B (2012-049A). She joins her sister-ship MetOp-A launched in 2006. In total, three of these polar-orbiting satellites are planned.

(click image to enlarge)

Yesterday evening, two days after launch, it was briefly clear in Leiden. With scattered clouds in the sky (see the streaks in the upper right corner of the image) I shot the above image of Metop-B passing through Lyra (brightest star is Vega).

A very faint second trail can be seen near the right end of the brighter MetOp-B trail, going obliquely upwards. This is an old Russian r/b (1982-096B) from the 1982 launch of Kosmos 1410.

MetOp-B's older sister ship, MetOp-A, is known among amateurs for producing bright flares (up to mag. -2) when the solar panels reflect sunlight to the observer (see my video here). Hopefully MetOp-B will show this spectacular behaviour as well.

In addition to MetOp-B, the short observation window amidst the clouds also permitted to observe FIA Radar 2 (2012-014A).

FIA Radar 2 (NROL-25) observed - with video

On the night of April 3/4, the NRO launched NROL-25, a new classified satellite. This satellite, FIA Radar 2 (USA 234) is the second of the FIA Radar satellites, and the third launch (assuming that the failed USA 193 was the first) in the Future Imagery Architecture (FIA) series. It received the SSC catalogue entry #38109, international Cospar launch code 2012-014A.

Like its earlier sistership FIA Radar 1, FIA Radar 2 is in an unusual retrograde orbit (proving that it is a radar satellite). Going from estimated search elements by Ted Molczan, Scott Tilley in the US Canada was the first to see the new object on April 4 some 5 hours after the launch. Following that, a.o. Björn Gimle in Sweden, Russell Eberst in Scotland, Alexander Repnoy in Russia and Kevin Fetter and Ted Molczan in Canada observed it.

I was clouded out on Wednesday 4 April, but yesterday evening (5 April) was clear and it was finally my turn: I could observe both evening passes, and film them. The above video provides a compilation of the obtained footage.

The first pass occurred in late twilight near 19:33 UTC , the second at 21:16 UTC (23:16 pm local time). A Near-full moon resulted in a quite light sky.  During the first pass, my GPS time inserter had some trouble maintaining the time signal (see "GPS Bad" message in first part of the footage above) and by coincidence my photo camera malfunctioned as well (due to a mistake with the wire release). Luckily, I had a second pass at 75 degree elevation 1.5 hours later, during which I could obtain a good set of positional data.

FIA Radar 2 was about mag. +4 and steady in brightness. Radio observers report a fading cycle in the radio signal, but visually the object is very steady.

I obtained some photographs as well, during the second pass of the evening. Below is a picture (Canon EOS 450D + EF 2.5/50mm Macro) shot while FIA Radar 2 crossed through the tail of the Big Dipper (Alcor & Mizar in top of the image). It is not the best of images due to the moonlight, but shows the satellite trail well in this 5-second exposure:

click image to enlarge

Over the comings days/weeks the new satellite will probably be actively manoeuvering, so it will be a nice object to keep track off!