Iranian Safir 2 r/b still slowly flaring

Yesterday evening, the atmosphere was very dynamic, with short clear spells repeatedly giving way to fields of clouds.

Nothwithstanding these conditions, I managed to image the Keyhole USA 129 (96-072A) again, plus the Iranian rocket booster Safir 2 r/b (09-004B) that launched OMID in February. I imaged it earlier in the morning of 7 March.

At that time, it showed bright flares in a slow pattern. It is still doing so, as yesterday evening's images show. The time between the bright glints is slightly less than it was early this month. I determined a 31.7 second interval between two of the glints, with glint times at (March 29 UTC):

19:57:19.5 UTC
19:57:51.2 UTC

On March 7, the determined glint interval was 33.25 seconds.

Below are the two images of last evening, plus the brightness curves. The glints appear to be slightly asymetric, with a slightly more shallow fall-off of the brightness after the glint maximum:

(click images to enlarge)

An Iranian rocket (Safir 2 r/b)

Weather finally allowed me to observe one of the new Iranian objects from the February 2nd launch. It concerned the rocket booster from the launch, the Safir 2 r/b (09-004B).

Conditions were not perfect (somewhat hazy), but the rocket booster was well visible and I captured it on two images (see below). It showed a clear very slow amplitude brightness variation (amplitude >20 seconds), going between mag. +3 and near-invisibility for the naked eye (> +4). Around the brightness peak it gives a short bright glint. Both my photographs captured such a glint.

(update) Based on the two pictures, and assuming I didn't miss a glint in between them, the glint period is 33.25 seconds, with glints at:

7 Mar 2009 04:26:12.60 UTC
7 Mar 2009 04:26:45.85 UTC

Below the two pictures (as usual, Canon EOS 450D @ 800 ISO + EF 50/2.5 Macro @ F2.8), and the brightness profiles for these trails.

(click images to enlarge)