UNID geosat Unknown 121118 is probably the classified SIGINT Mercury 1 (94-054A)

As I reported on this blog earlier, I discovered an unidentified object in an 8.4 degree inclined geosynchronous orbit in the evening of November 18 (see images below). It was given the designation "Unknown 121118" and also observed by Greg Roberts from South Africa the next evening, showing it to be truely geosynchronous at longitude 48 E.

click images to enlarge

I initially thought it would probably be a commercial satellite that had been recently relocated. However, as USSTRATCOM has still not identified the object, we are beginning to suspect it is a classified object, and we have some idea of its identity.

Ted Molczan pointed out that the 8.44 degree inclination is similar to that of Mercury 1 (94-054A). The brightness of the object is similar too. Mercury 1 was last located over the western Atlantic near 43 W, and had not been observed for over two months. Peter Wakelin imaged its former position on November 21 and could not find it. So there is a good chance it has been moved, and is my Unknown 121118, now located at 48 E.

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The Mercury (also known as 'Advanced Vortex' ) geostationary satellites are classified US military SIGINT ('eavesdropping') satellites. Two were launched during the 1990-ies: the launch of a third one failed when the rocket booster malfunctioned, destroying the satellite. Mercury 1 (94-054A) launched on 27 August 1994 was the first. Given that it now appears to have been repositioned and is station-keeping at 48 E, is appears to be still operational, 18 years after it was launched.

Why it has been repositioned over 48 E, somewhere within the last two months (and probably near the more recent part of that timespan) is a matter of speculation. Maybe it is monitoring communications on the Syria-Turkey border; maybe it is listening in on Iran; or maybe it is monitoring communications of Somalian pirates near the Horn of Africa.

In June this year I imaged Mercury 1's sister ship Mercury 2 (see here), which was of a similar brightness as 'Unknown 121118'. That object at that time seemed headed for a graveyard orbit and hasn't been observed for a while. It has a slightly larger orbital inclination than Mercury 1 / Unknown 121118.

PAN, other Geostationary satellites, and another UNID (this time Greg's)

As reported earlier I had a prolific observing session on Geostationary satellites in the evening of November 18th, discovering amongst others an unidentified geostationary object now temporarily designated Unknown 121118 (see here and follow-up here with imagery by Greg from S-Africa: an more on it near the end of the current post).

Below is some more imagery showing various classified and unclassified objects. All images were made using a Canon EOS 60D with a SamYang 1.4/85mm lens at ISO 1000.


Unknown 20121117 (Greg's UNID)

The November 18th imagery includes imagery of a second unidentified object, Unknown 121117 discovered by Greg Roberts (CoSaTrak) from South Africa a day earlier on the 17th (a third initially reported  'unid 'by Greg turned out to be identifiable as a known object, a Chinese CZ-3C r/b). So Greg recovered my Nov 18th UNID on the 19th, and I recovered Greg's Nov 17 UNID on the 18th: nice teamwork!

The image below shows it together with a number of nearby commercial geosats (the veil-like lighter streaks in the image are cirrus clouds, who had begone to invade an initially clear sky):

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Below is one of Greg's images of the object from 17 November taken from S-Africa: in my image above taken a day later the object has drifted quite a distance more to the West.

(image courtesy Greg Roberts, CoSatTrak S-Africa)

Unknown 121117 is a truely uncatalogued object. There is nevertheless some idea about the identity of this satellite, but I am currently not allowed to provide more information.



PAN

PAN (09-047A) and the nearby commercial geosat Paksat 1R visible in Greg's Nov 17th image are visible on my Nov 18th imagery as well. The image below basically fits to the upper image above (see the Eutelsat pair visible in both images), giving you a sense how Greg's Unknown 2012117 has moved in a day time:

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I have written about PAN on this blog several times before: it is an enigmatic classified satellite that frequently relocates.


Mentor 4, Thuraya 2 and the Mentor 1r

Among the other objects imaged were the SIGINT Mentor 4 (and the nearby commercial satellite Thuraya 2), and a r/b from the Mentor 1 launch, Mentor 1r.

Mentors (the biggest geostationary satellites in existence and the biggest man-made objects in space with exception of the ISS) are relatively bright objects (typically mag. +8):

click image to enlarge

I already posted imagery of another Mentor, Mentor 5, as well as the SIGINT Vortex 6 in an earlier post.


More on my UNID, Unknown 121118

This object in an 8.5 degree inclined geosynchronous orbit (see here and here for earlier coverage) remains 'unidentified' (i.e., is not present in public orbital catalogues such as USSTRATCOM's): we are however starting to believe it could be a classified object that has recently been moved to this location from somewhere else. It is currently positioned over 48.3 E and appears stable in longitude:

click map to enlarge

Greg's Nov 19th imagery of my geostationary UNID (UNK121118)

click image to enlarge (image courtesy Greg Roberts)

The imagery above is posted with kind permission of Greg Roberts (CoSaTrak, South Africa). It depicts the same geosynchronous UNID that I imaged from the Netherlands on the 18th, in an image Greg shot from South Africa on the 19th.

This object does not match with anything in USSTRATCOM's current satellite catalogue, or in our classified satellite catalogue. It probably is a commercial satellite that very recently has been relocated to this spot: if so, USSTRATCOM seems not yet aware of it.We have not been able yet to identify which satellite it could be.

For my November 18 discovery imagery of this object, click here.

As the object moves in an orbit with an inclination of 8.1 degrees, it makes a small daily "up and down wobble" perpendicular to the celestial equator (many geosynchronous objects do that). This is the reason it is showing a small trail in this 40-second exposure.

(the nearby object marked EUTE 48A in the imagery is the commercial geostationary satellite Eutelsat 48A)

An Unidentified geostationary object

Yesterday evening was (initially) very clear. I took the opportunity to image the USA 144 decoy (1999-028C)  in the early evening, and then do a survey of the eastern geostationary belt between 23h and 24h LT.

The USA 144 decoy passed close to the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and was caught together with this galaxy and a Breeze-M tank (2011-021C, from the Telstar 14R launch):

click image to enlarge

The session on geostationary satellites later in the evening was ended by incoming cirrus, but not before a fair number of objects was imaged.


A UNID geosat in Orion

Among them was a bright unidentified object in an 8-degree inclined (near-) geostationary orbit captured in several images.

The images below (overview, and then details) show it in Orion together with the Orion nebula, a Chinese r/b (Beidou CZ-3C r/b, 2010-024B), and the classified SIGINT objects Mentor 5 (USA 237, 2012-034A) and Vortex 6 (1989-035A).

click images to enlarge

While the object is unidentified at the moment, it probably is a commercial geostationary satellite that is being moved to a new slot or to a graveyard orbit: but with the tracking network of USSTRATCOM not having noted this yet.

For the moment, the object has been designated as Unknown 121118. It moves in this very approximate orbit (calculated by Mike McCants):

Unknown 121118
1 99991U 12009B   12323.84298080 0.00000000  00000-0  00000-0 0    02
2 99991   8.1179  50.0556 0005003 274.8696  85.1304  1.00270000    07

Initially, I thought it might be the same "unid" reported by Greg in the same general area the day before, but it turns out to be another object. Greg's "unid" was identified by Mike as 2010-024B, a Beidou CZ-3 r/b, actually the same object that can be seen close to USA 237 in the images above.

UPDATE 19-11-2012, 20:20 UT: Greg Roberts just mailed me that he recovered the UNID from South Africa at virtually the same position, so it is geostationary. See follow-up post here.