KH-12 USA 129 and a Chinese rocket stage (CZ-2C r/b) cruising up together

Tuesday evening, the sky was very hazy and a waxing moon was high in the sky. Conditions were hence abominable, but I managed to capture both evening KH-12's, USA 129 (96-072A) and USA 186 (05-042A). The pictures are not pretty, as they are quite fogged.

The pass of USA 129 was confusing, as a second bright object close to it was moving parallel to it: at the moment of observation, I was not sure which object was the Keyhole and what the other object was! It took me rather by surprise (and as a result, I mis-aligned the camera for the second image, resulting in only one image).

It turned out to be a Chinese Long March rocket stage, a CZ-2C r/b (09-061B) from the launch of Shijian 11-01 on November 12, 2009. Below is the image, showing them cruising up together in a moon-fogged sky:

click image to enlarge

A few days earlier, on 11 March, I observed USA 186 (05-042A), Lacrosse 5 (05-016A) and the USA 144 Decoy (99-028C). I obtained a series of images on the latter, and hopefully these can be employed for a brightness variation reconstruction again (to be reported on later, after I have had some time to do the analysis).

Lacrosse 5 was racing against an untimely field of clouds that evening, yielding this picture of a bright satellite trail and a wisp of moving cloud:

click image to enlarge

The satellite did it's "disappearance trick" again during culmination north, reappearing very brightly for a brief period after it.

Earlier that evening, in a still mostly clouded sky, I saw METOP-A flaring brightly to at least -3 at about 20:09:20 UTC (March 11).

A farewell view of Space Shuttle Discovery

This evening in twilight (sun at -8 degrees altitude) we had a last pass of the "dynamic duo" Space Shuttle Discovery STS-133 and the International Space Station (ISS).

After it's landing tomorrow late afternoon, Discovery will be retired.

The two were well visible in a still bright blue sky, with Orion just visible. They sailed under Orion through Lepus, the Shuttle leading 37.4 seconds (about 19 degrees at culmination) in front of the ISS.

Below is one of the images I shot, using the EF 2.8/24mm lens at 4 second exposure, 200 ISO. The Shuttle is the trail on the left, ISS on the right:

click image to enlarge

Several other European observers reported a water-dump, visible as a "comet tail" behind the Shuttle. I didn't see it from Leiden though, likely because the sky was still too bright.

The ISS and Space Shuttle Discovery STS-133

Space Shuttle Discovery STS-133 undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) on Monday, and some 6 hours later made two passes visible from my locality.

The first pass was at 18:48 local time (CET) in very deep twilight, with the sun only 4 degrees under the horizon. This meant the sky was still bright blue. A crescent moon was visible (with the ISS passing only a few degrees away from it), but almost no stars.

Nevertheless both ISS and STS-133 were well visible by the naked eye around culmination: the Shuttle was about 5 to 6 degrees in front of the ISS and slightly fainter.

A second pass, this time in a dark sky, was on an extremely low elevation of 12 degrees at 19:25:30 UTC. Yet due to the very clear sky, they were well visible by the naked eye again, truely at rooftop level:

click image to enlarge

In the image, the two trails overlap at their ends, creating one long trail. A difference in brightness shows where the ISS trail ends.

The Shuttle and ISS were 7.27 seconds apart, at a distance of 2.5 degrees, with the Shuttle leading. This corresponds to 54.5 km separation in reality.

At the deep twilight passage, I used my Canon EOS 450D, laptop and "EOS Camera Movie Record" software to record a short movie (below), showing the crescent moon and the ISS passing near it, low in the west. The Shuttle was still too faint to be seen at that time, brightening to naked eye brightness only when it was closer to culmination.

Twice the ISS

Below are two images showing the International Space Station (ISS) pass over my observatory.

The first was made on the evening of March 3 and shows it passing between the Hyades and Pleiades. It is a stack of 3 images of 10s each.

The second was taken this evening (March 6) and is a stack of 10 images of 10s each, showing it pass under Orion and Sirius.

Lens used in both cases was an EF 2.8/24mm.

click images to enlarge

It's geosat flare season! (1)

Around this time of the year, just before spring equinox, the sun is moving through the orbital plane of the geostationary belt. As a result, two things happen:

(1) directly opposite the sun, geostationary satellites "disappear"in the earth shadow for a while;

(2) just before that, they can flare brightly (sometimes to naked eye magnitudes).

Last two evenings I spent some time photographing the relevant part of the geostationary belt, using the EF 2.5/50mm (24 x 18 degrees FOV).

Normally, this lens has too small an aperture to capture geosats (with the exception of the very bright Mentor's). But in the geosat flare season, scores of brightening geosats turn up on the images!

Below animated GIF shows Eutelsat W4 (left) and W7 (right). Both are flaring (normally I need the Zeiss 180mm lens to capture them!), and especially W7 becomes very bright near 21:04 UTC (March 4, 2011). The animation has been made using a series of 12 images taken at approximately 2 min intervals (Canon EOS 450D + EF 2.5/50mm Macro @ F2.8, 800 ISO, 10s):



The "wobble" of W7 is not real, but an effect of small changes in the camera tilt over the series (sorry, tripod was on a bumpy field of grass).

Below image is a crop from a single photograph (one of the series that also contained both Eutelsats above) taken around 4 March 20:46 UTC showing Turksat 2A and 3A both flaring, with Turksat 3A being extremely bright (it was visible by the naked eye). Twenty minutes later, both had become invisible due to entry in the earth's shadow:

click image to enlarge

Libya jamming Thuraya 2

In an effort to prevent dissemination of information, Khadaffi's forces in Libya are now jamming several communication satellites that serve Libya, including Thuraya, Reuters reports. (see also a press release by the Thuraya company here)

The Thuraya satellite being jammed is Thuraya 2 (2003-026A), a geosynchronous satellite located at 44 degrees East, over East Africa:

click map to enlarge

I have imaged this satellite several times, as it's position is close to that of USA 202/Mentor 4 (09-001A). Thuraya 2 is the upper of the two objects in below image, which I shot at 8 December 2010 using the Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar MC 2.8/180mm:

click image to enlarge

I wonder whether the jamming is not only aimed at Thuraya 2, but perhaps also at the nearby Mentor. The latter is a SIGINT satellite, and jamming it would hamper US intelligence gathering on what is currently going on within Libya (and northern Africa and the Arabian peninsula in general). It is not clear to me however whether the jamming is "local" on the Thuraya downlink over Libya, or actively aimed (in an "uplink" sense) at the satellite.

Libya was accused of jamming Thuraya 2 earlier in 2006 (see here and here).

FIA Radar 1 and a flaring Topex near the Andromeda Galaxy

In the evening of Februari 8 I observed the KH-12 Keyhole USA 129 (96-072A) which is becoming visible for my location again, and the FIA Radar 1 (10-046A).

The latter moved close to M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. In the same image is another satellite, Topex (92-052A), which is flaring (it is present in a second image too). All together, this yielded this nice image:

(click image to enlarge)

Topex was part of a joint US/French oceanographic experiment. Launched in 1992, it functioned up to 2005. With the loss of attitude control since it ceased functioning, it has started to tumble, producing flashes.

I also observed the FIA Radar 1 on February 3rd, together with the USA 144 decoy (99-028C)

Yesterday, on Februari 12th after a day full of drizzle, it unexpectedly cleared around midnight, allowing me to photograph the geostationary SIGINT satellite Mentor 2 (98-029A) which at that time was just south of Procyon:

(click image to enlarge)

NROL-27 patches

NROL-27 is slated to be launched on March 11 on a Delta IV rocket. Two patches have appeared for this classified launch so far, both featuring a Gryphon:

(click images to enlarge)

Some independant analysts believe NROL-27 will be a geostationary SDS satellite. The patches, especially the second one, tend to support that suspicion.

The Latin "Nos Suo Caelum" in the second patch means "We Connect the Heavens". This is exactly what SDS satellites do: they provide an uplink and downlink platform between other (reconnaissance) satellites and their operating centers. The red Dragon in the second patch, might indicate this new SDS will notably serve a role for SIGINT satellites (as historically, dragons in patches signify SIGINT satellites).

The Gryphon, part lion, part eagle, features in both patches. Gryphons guard treasure and possessions, and are symbols of the divine and divine power; strength, military courage and leadership. The "Custos Divini" in the first patch means "Guardian of the Divine".

Satellites near the Pleiades

Yesterday evening (Saturday 29 January) some satellites seemed to be in love with the Pleiades. In a somewhat hazy sky, I observed Lacrosse 3 (97-064A) cruising near the Pleiades and Hyades in twilight, and half an hour later watched the NOSS 3-4 duo (07-027 A & C) cruise right through the Pleiades.

Below are the resulting images. The top image of the NOSS duo cruising through the Pleiades (movement is from top to bottom, with 07-027A leading) was made using the Canon EF 100/2.8 Macro USM lens: the images of Lacrosse 3 were made using the EF 50/2.5 Macro lens.

click images to enlarge

The FIA Radar 1 (10-046A) was imaged as well. Unlike a few nights ago, it did not flare.

The previous night had a better quality sky, so I targetted a few geostationary satellites low above the horizon. Classified geostationary targets imaged were PAN (09-047A), Mentor 2 (98-029A), Mentor 4/USA 202 (09-001A) and the Milstar 5 r/b (02-001B). A number of commercial geostationary satellites were captured as well.

Below image, taken with the Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar MC 2.8/180mm, shows PAN with the nearby commercial geostationary Yamal 202 (03-053A).

click image to enlarge

The image below, taken with the EF 2.5/50mm Macro, shows Mentor 2, with the stars of Orion's belt and Orion's nebula M42 at left:

click image to enlarge

I also accidentally captured a mag. +2.5 sporadic meteor in one of the images taken with the Carl Zeiss 180 mm (FOV only 5 x 7 degrees!):

click image to enlarge

FIA Radar 1 flaring!

Yesterday evening I had a short clear window of opportunity before clouds rolled in. I tried in vain to spot Nanosail-D in deep twilight, and next targetted the FIA Radar 1 (10-046A) again.

Much to my surprise (as I had not see it do that before), it flared twice. At about 17:54:11 UTC (25 Jan) the first brief but bright flare, to mag. -1 occurred. Unfortunately, I was re-aiming the camera at that moment. The satellite flared again however, to mag. +0.5, at 17:54:37.0 UTC, and this time the camera was photographing. Below is the resulting image, and the brightness curve derived from it. It are actually two flares, as a slightly fainter flare at 17:54:35.7 preceeds the main flare.

click image to enlarge

click diagram to enlarge

Later that evening, during a second brief period of clear sky, I imaged Mentor 2 (98-029A) in Orion.

I also observed on the 20th (The FIA Radar 1 again, and Milstar 5r (02 001B)) and the 22nd (USA 200, 08-010A), during short clear spells.

The FIA Radar, USA 179 (SDS 3-3) and more

On the 5th, 9th, 10th and on the 16th of January, the skies shortly cleared in the evening and I observed the FIA 1 Radar (10-046A) making some nice passes through the winter sky. On the 16th it was a particularly close race with clouds coming in (the last image in the series has clouds in the image frame).

Below are two images: one from the 10th showing the FIA 1 Radar passing close to the Pleiades; the other showing it passing through the alpha Persei association on Jan 16th.

click images to enlarge

I also observed the Molniya orbit satellite USA 179 (SDS 3-3) on the 16th, which was close to the alpha Persei association too. As it was too faint for the 50mm lens, I used the Carl Zeiss Jena 180mm lens for it (brightest star in image is alpha Persei):

click image to enlarge

Other objects observed include PAN (09-047A) on the 9th of January. It is still in the fixed position at 49.0 E where it is since December 24 (see earlier post here). That same evening, Mentor 4 (USA 202), Mentor 2 and the Milstar 5 r/b were observed as well. A flashing H2A rocket, 06-059A, was captured as a stray. On the 5th of January, the IGS R2 r/b was captured in twilight, being very fast and very bright.

OT - A Space related Patch?

As some of you know, I not only observe classified satellites - I also collect the uniform patches relating to their launch, mission, and the associated military units.

Recently I obtained the patch pictured above. The seller listed it as "space related" but without more information.

I bought it because I had a hunch it could perhaps be related to NAVSPASUR. This because of the theme of what at first sight appears to be a sailor (but on second sight could be a hamburger flipper as well...) in a southern US desert (Saguaro cactus) looking at the sky, and the "stare" (NAVSPASUR is/was a Radar "fence", i.e. a staring radar, not a tracking radar). I could be completely wrong though.

Googling for "Operation Vigilant Stare" does not yield any result. If anyone has more information regarding this patch, please drop me a note at sattrackcam * wanadoo dot nl (replace the * with an @).

PAN (no longer drifting) on January 2nd 2011

As I discovered on December 8th 2010 (see here), PAN had started to drift away from it's old position at 38.0 E on 2010 December 1st (see here).

Greg Roberts in South Africa and me in the Netherlands followed it drifting eastwards at a rate of about 0.5 degrees/day over mid-December 2010. I dropped out of the chase after December 14th, when a long period of wintery weather with snow started in the Netherlands.

On December 27th, Greg failed to recover it at the position projected by the drift rate and surmissed it had stopped drifting. He confirmed this on December 29th, when he found it in position 49.0 E. It has stayed in that stable position since.

Below diagram shows that it reached that position at 2010 December 24.2:

click diagram to enlarge

Yesterday evening (2 January 2011) I managed to image PAN in it's new 49.0 E position during a short period of clearings:

click image to enlarge

I am happy the drift has stopped, as PAN otherwise would have slowly drifted out of my reach. In it's new position, it is lower and more to the northeast in the sky for me: actually it is now quite low at an altitude of only 17.9 degrees (just above tree-top and roof-top level for my locality), 5 degrees lower in altitude and 11.3 degrees more eastward in azimuth than it was in November 2010.

Below diagram shows the change in azimuth and altitude between late November 2010 (right) and now (left).

click diagram to enlarge

Summary of 2010 observations

The year has come to an end, and it is time to present the summary of observations conducted the past year.

2010 was a good year. A total of 1074 positions were determined on a total of 121 objects, on 78 observing nights. A total of 918 positions on 39 objects of these concerned classified objects.

The diagram below shows the breakdown of the number of observing nights and number of determined satellite positions per month over 2010:

click image to enlarge diagram

In August and November, I travelled abroad for part of the month and during those periods could not observe. October and the second half of December had very bad weather.

The diagram below shows, just for fun, all gathered positions on an RA/Dec map:

click diagram to enlarge

This was the first year I added geostationary objects to my observing program: these show up well as lines of positions near declination -7 degrees.

Lists of objects observed in 2010 (click lists to enlarge):

Additional observations not included in the special interest table are observations on the flashing pattern of the Iridium 33 wreckage.

OT: (3200) Phaethon, the Geminid meteor shower parent body

This is somewhat Off-Topic as it doesn't concern satellites. It does however concern two other astronomical interests of me: meteors and asteroids.

On December 13th, the annual Geminid meteor shower peaked. Twelve days later, on December 25th, I made this image of the parent body of this meteor shower, asteroid (3200) Phaethon.

The image was made 'remotely' using the 37 cm F14 Cassegrain of Winer Observatory in Sonoita, Nevada (MPC 857). It is a stack of 4 images of 150s exposure each, spaced 20 minutes. It shows the 4 positions taken by the (moving) asteroid for each of these 4 images in this time span. As tracking was on the asteroid motion, the stars are small trails. The asteroid was about magnitude +16.

click image to enlarge

For an interactive orbit plot of (3200) Phaethon, click here.

A second NROL-41 (FIA Radar 1) patch

Grey overcast skies and snow do not allow observations currently. South-African observations by Ian Roberts show that PAN was still drifting as off 21 December. Will be interesting to see where the drifting stops (if it continues this way, it will soon drift out of my reach).

In a week or so from now, I will be preparing my overview of 2010 observations. For now, I want to fill the weather-induced lul in observations by showing a recent addition to the patch collection.

A patch for NROL-41, the FIA Radar 1 launch (2010-046A), was shown earlier on this blog here. Recently I however acquired a second patch, which is of much better design:

click image to enlarge

Patch designs of the black space program have become a bit generic and bland lately, perhaps as the result of this NRO Director's memo, but the NROL-41 patch above is beautiful. And, with hindsight, offering some clues (to what we now already know from our own observations).

The clue is in the heroine archer. She is aiming for the setting sun (i.e., westwards). I feel this could very well be an allusion to the unusual retrograde (westward) orbit of the FIA 1 Radar.

The purple 'vermicelli' pattern in the nighttime earth actually includes a few character combinations, i.e. acronyms, of units and organizations connected to the launch. Recognizable are amongst others 'NRO', and what appears to be '4 SLS' and 'LRS' or 'LRSW'.

It would be interesting to know what the three white stars in the patch rim signify.

When did PAN start to drift?

click diagram to enlarge

Answer: on December 1st. Which tallies with it still being at her old position at 38.0 deg E on November 28.

A satellite in the "fish mouth" of Orion's nebula, and nine geosats in one image

Sunday evening, I shot a number of images of the geostationary belt in Orion using the Carl Zeiss Jena 2.8/180 mm lens. This yielded amongst others a very pretty picture of the Milstar 6 r/b (03-013B), snapped when it was located spot on in the dark "fish mouth" area of M42, the Orion nebula:

click image to enlarge

The image below shows a full image shot, measuring 6.8 x 5 degrees. It shows as much as 9 geostationary satellites (3 classified and 6 commercial) in the same image. Numbered boxes refer to the detail images below the main image. Note how many of them (boxes 3 to 6) line up along declination -7.3 degrees, in a line from bottom left to upper right.

click on image to enlarge

Mystery satellite "UNKNOWN 101208" is PAN!

Those of you following this observing blog and the Satobs list, will be aware of the observations of the past week of what appeared to be an unknown geostationary satellite.

It was first observed on December 8th by me, and next by Greg Roberts as well (see here for the discovery, as well as here, and here for the follow-up).

It was first thought to be perhaps DSCS 3-11, but that turned out to be incorrect. So it was a bit of a mystery, as no recent launch was a candidate either. And geosats just don't "materialize" in the sky. Obviously, this was an older geosat being relocated: but which one?!

The mystery has now been solved, by Greg Roberts. The satellite is PAN (2009-047A), relocating to a position more to the east.

Greg imaged the old position of PAN (close to Paksat 1) on the 12th, but couldn't detect it. So he made the obvious conclusion: PAN was gone and identical to the eastwards drifting satellite we called "Unknown 101208" since December 8th.

I can actually confirm Greg's result of the 12th: I imaged the "old" position as well that same evening and like Greg find no trace of PAN, only Paksat 1 is present.

So how about my "observation" of PAN near the "old" position on December 8th, the same evening that I first spotted "Unknown 101208"?!?

It is very embarasing, but I turn out te have been fooled by an image artefact! With hindsight, I should have been suspicious: the little dot I thought was PAN was quite faint, and visible on only one out of 2 images. This unlike my November 28th observations, when the true PAN clearly showed up in its "old" position on multiple images.

Below image shows the image artefact that fooled me on the 8th (the insets show details of this image, and a second image taken 20 seconds later on the same evening which only shows Paksat 1 - which with hindsight should have warned me).

click image to enlarge

Here is another image, showing PAN and Paksat 1 on November 28, and Paksat 1 with PAN no longer present on December 12th.

click image to enlarge

With the current drift rate of just under 0.5 deg/day, PAN probably started to relocate on or around December 1st.

Recovering SDS 3-3 (USA 179) and following the UNKNOWN 101208 geosat

Our amateur network had lost track recently of the HEO satellite SDS 3-3 (USA 179, 2004-034A), so it had to be recovered. Radio doppler shift data by an amateur remaining anonymous provided enough information to Ted Molczan to issue a search orbit for visual or camera recovery.

Last evening started clear, and I quickly recovered it very close to Ted's predicted search orbit position. It was about 0.3 degrees off from the latter, so a very neat result! See the image below, the first in a series I shot yesterday with the Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar MC 2.8/180mm:

click image to enlarge

After imaging another HEO too, the ELINT USA 184 (2006-027A), clouds came in. The situation turned very dynamic, with the sky going from clear to clouded to clear in a matter of minutes.

I wanted to see if I could image the 'mystery geostationary satellite' which I discovered on 8 December again, a satellite that has now been temporarily designated as Unknown 101208. With my initial December 8 observations and Greg Robert's December 9 & 10 observations, Mike could fit a reasonably good orbit:

Unknown 101208
1 99991U          10344.69054052 0.00000000  00000-0  00000-0 0    03
2 99991   0.0670  10.3484 0003000 147.2004 212.7996  1.00405600    05

The object is drifting eastward at a rate of about 0.5 degrees/day and is now well east of the Turksat 2A & 3A duo (it was west of them when I discovered it on the 8th). It's identity still remains a mystery. Early ideas about it being a DSCS relocating, can now be dismissed.

Under very dynamic conditions, I managed to take advantage of a clearing that lasted literally only minutes (!) to capture it again last evening, along with a few others in the same image. The latter objects were the Milstar 6 r/b (2003-012B) and Mentor 4 (USA 202, 2009-001A), and in addition the non-classified geostationaries Turksat 2A & 3A, Thuraya 2 and Express AM-1.

While the image quality was bad (quite fogged images), the object clearly showed up. Below is one of the images, showing the mystery satellite with the Turksat duo. Compare to the December 8th picture here, when the mystery satellite was still west of the Turksats:

click image to enlarge