Sunday, 17 February 2013

Movie: Why the Russian Super Meteor was not related to asteroid 2012 DA14 - explained with the help of an orange

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Dutch note: een Nederlandstalige versie van deze video is eerder hier gepost . Added Note: the reality is slightly more complex than ...

Filmpje: waarom de supermeteoor boven Rusland niets te maken heeft met planetoide 2012 DA14 - uitgelegd met behulp van een sinaasappel

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Note to English readers: an English version of the Dutch language video below is posted in a separate post here . Toegevoegde noot:  H...
3 comments:
Saturday, 16 February 2013

On national television about 2012 DA14 and the Russian super meteor

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Yesterday was a crazy day, that started as soon as I woke up, opened my e-mail and saw the messages about the Russian super meteor event . N...
2 comments:
Friday, 15 February 2013

[updated] HUGE fireball over Russia this morning! Not 2012 DA14 related.

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A HUGE fireball has appeared over Chelyabinsk, Russia, this morning. And with HUGE I mean: HUGE. Apparent brightness rivalling the sun, and ...
1 comment:
Wednesday, 13 February 2013

Fireball over NW Europe of the evening of 13 February 2013: Re-entry of a Soyuz r/b

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Reports are pouring in of a very long duration, bright fireball near 22:15 CET (21:15 GMT) seen from Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany. R...
1 comment:
Monday, 4 February 2013

OT - a new telescope and imaging the moon

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Since 18 November I have done little in terms of satellite observing, for reasons outlined below. Therefore, a post that is slightly OT - b...
Wednesday, 9 January 2013

Mapping a year of space debris re-entries

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The year 2012 saw as many as 72 uncontrolled re-entries of larger pieces of space debris. Just for fun, I mapped the data for those 52 re-...
1 comment:
Tuesday, 1 January 2013

2012 in summary

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It is time for a summary of the observations conducted in 2012. I have been less active in 2012 than in previous years, logging about half...
Monday, 24 December 2012

The flashing behaviour of North Korea's tumbling Kwangmyongsong 3-2 satellite

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North Korea's first satellite Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) cannot be seen from the northern hemisphere at the moment (and hence cannot ...
1 comment:
Monday, 17 December 2012

[UPDATED] A post-analysis of the N-Korean launch window, and N-Korean Spooks on my weblog?

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On December 12, North Korea surprised the Western world by successfully bringing its first independently confirmed satellite into orbit: Kwa...
Thursday, 29 November 2012

Video of my lecture (in Dutch) on Hunting for Asteroids and the Van der Bilt Prize ceremony, 10 November 2012

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As related earlier on this blog , I was much honoured to receive the Dr J. Van der Bilt Prize of the Royal Dutch Astronomy and Meteorology ...
Friday, 23 November 2012

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

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As I reported on this blog earlier , I discovered an unidentified object in an 8.4 degree inclined geosynchronous orbit in the evening of No...
Wednesday, 21 November 2012

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

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As reported earlier I had a prolific observing session on Geostationary satellites in the evening of November 18th, discovering amongst oth...
Tuesday, 20 November 2012

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

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click image to enlarge (image courtesy Greg Roberts) The imagery above is posted with kind permission of Greg Roberts ( CoSaTrak , Sou...
Monday, 19 November 2012

An Unidentified geostationary object

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Yesterday evening was (initially) very clear. I took the opportunity to image the USA 144 decoy (1999-028C)  in the early evening, and then...

Belated: imaging ATV-3 late September

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click images to enlarge I am very much belated in posting the images above: they show ATV-3 imaged by me in morning twilight of 30 S...
Thursday, 15 November 2012

Is it a bird, or a possible UNID satellite?

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Yesterday, asteroid (2397) Lappajarvi would occult the mag. +7.8 star HIP 19971 in Taurus. I was some 106 km outside of the predicted occul...
Sunday, 11 November 2012

Receiving the Dr J. van der Bilt Prize

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In 1945, the Royal Dutch Astronomy and Meteorology Association ( KNVWS ) established the Dr. J. van der Bilt Prize , named after professiona...
Wednesday, 31 October 2012

A sad loss for SatTrackCam - R.I.P. Pippi (our cat), 12 May 2006 - 30 Oct 2012.

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Pippi, 12 May 2006 - †30 October 2012 SatTrackCam Leiden (Cospar 4353) suffered a painful loss yesterday. Pippi, our cat, died from k...