PAN is on the move, and detection of an unknown object in near-GEO

Last Wednesday evening (16 May) saw very clear skies. Combined with the absence of moonlight, an ideal situation to target geostationary objects, which are low in the sky for me at 52 N. As they are low  and I am in an urban environment, I need a very transparent sky.

Normally I use the 2.8/180mm Zeiss Sonnar, but this time I went for the SamYang 1.4/85mm. The limiting magnitude of this fine lens is only slightly less than that of the 180mm, but the FOV is twice as large (10 x 14 degrees). It is a geostationary magnet: in one single image I counted 20 geostationary or near-geostationary objects! In total, the session (a sweep of some 25 degrees of equatorial sky in the S-SE, at elevations of 15 to 25 degrees) recorded 38 objects: 7 classifieds, 30 unclassifieds and one unknown.


An UNKNOWN object on May 16

As part of the session, an object in near-Geostationary space was serendipitously observed that cannot be matched to any known object (for recorded positions, see here). It was slowly moving near the commercial geosats Eutelsat 36A and Eutelsat 36B (00-028A and 09-065A) and was captured on several images, small parts of four of which are shown below (note the movement relative to the stable Eutelsats):

click image to enlarge

As Heavensat with the latest orbital catalogues loaded showed nothing in this position I initially logged it as a 'UNID'. Then a check with Ted's IDSat software resulted in a very superficial match with the DSP F20 cover (00-024E), but a clearly non-linear delta T suggested this could be a spurious match (see the questionmark and note under my data report here).  Next Mike McCants contacted me, it was indeed a spurious match in his opinion as his analysis of my data suggested an approximate orbit that does not match the DSP F20 cover at all. So for now, the object is designated as UNKNOWN 120516.

Objects like this do not spontaneously materialize, and there is no recent launch that can account for this object. It is therefore likely an old object being relocated. According to Mike, one possible (but by far not certain) option is that it is the classified object Mercury 1 (94-054A, or USA 105), which has not been observed for some time, being retired and relocated to a graveyard orbit.

Unfortunately, both Greg Roberts in South Africa and me here in the Netherlands were clouded out last night and today, so follow-up using Mike's approximate search orbits is troublesome for the moment.


PAN being relocated again

Another classified geostationary object on the move again is the enigmatic PAN (09-047A). This object has an unusual history of frequent relocations, moving to and fro in longitude each few months. It was at 44.9 E in the spring of 2011, then relocated to 39.1 E in the summer of 2011 and next moved to 52.5 E somewhere between late October 2011 (I still observed it at 39.1E on 23 October 2011) and January 2012, when Greg Roberts noted it missing after which Ian Roberts recovered it at 52.5 E early February.

And now its is moving again: Greg Roberts was the first to note this on May 10 and recovered it on May 14 and May 16 while it was and is moving towards 39.1 E (a position it has previously occupied). I imaged it near 39.1 E too on Wednesday evening May 16. Below is a part of one of the images, showing PAN and several commercial geostationary objects, as well as two old rocket boosters in GTO:

click image to enlarge

 Other classified (near-)  geostationary objects observed this evening were the SIGINT Vortex 6 (89-035A, also in the process of being relocated), the SIGINT Mentor 4 (09-001A), it's rocket (09-001B), the Milstar 5 communication satellite (02-001A), the DSCS 3-13 R2 rocket (03-008C) and the DSP early-warning satellite DSP F23 (07-054A).

Apart from these geostationary objects, I observed the LEO object USA 186 (05-042A, a KH-12 Keyhole) as well that evening, in its new orbit after it manoeuvered earlier this year.

Voice reception (radio) of Soyuz TMA-04M bringing crew 31 to the ISS

On May 15 the Soyuz TMA-04M spacecraft was launched from Baikonur, bringing a fresh crew (crew 31) of Kosmonauts to the International Space Station.



At 09:04 UTC (11:04 am local time) this morning (May 16), it passed over Leiden. Using my old scanner radio (Realistic Pro-2042) and a homebrew dipole antenna, I listened in on 121.75 MHz as the Soyuz crew was talking (in Russian) to groundcontrol in Russia. Above is a 54 second record with the best part of the reception, starting at 09:03:40 UTC.

IGS 1B on 12 and 13 May

After a month of generally bad weather conditions, two clear evenings allowed to track IGS 1B (2003-009B) again, the malfunctioned Japanese spy satellite that will have an uncontrolled reentry this summer.

Below video shows footage from both evenings: it opens with May 12 footage of IGS 1B crossing through Bootes and Corona Borealis (25 mm lens), and next shows footage of May 13 showing it moving through Leo and Uma (9 mm wide angle lens)




The photograph below was shot in the evening of May 13 using the EF 2.0/35mm lens, showing IGS in Leo over the roof of my house:

click image to enlarge

Other objects tracked include the IGS 5 r/b (09-066B). I also obtained remote telescopic imagery of Prowler (90-097E) using the 37-cm Rigel telescope in Sonoita, Arizona.

An update on IGS 1B - a spy satellite about to reenter this summer

(updated reentry prediction at the end of this post)

Last year I wrote extensively about the malfunctioned Japanese spy satellite IGS 1B (2003-009B) which is about to reenter, uncontrolled, into the atmosphere soon. The above footage of the object was shot by me last April 13 and 14 and shows two passes over Leiden.

This radar satellite, launched to keep an eye on North-Korea in 2003, malfunctioned in March 2007, halfway though its mission. Since then, it has been steadily coming down (see diagrams below) in a way that clearly shows that the satellite operators do no longer have control over it.

Last year, I pointed to the fact that the 1.2 tons  satellite will reenter in 2012 (so this year), and likely still has some remnant fuel onboard. A subsequent assessment by high-end amateur satellite tracker Ted Molczan showed that this amount of fuel is limited - probably about 14 to 50 kg, an order of a magnitude less than the infamous case of USA 193 in 2008. This assessment is important, as an uncontrolled reentry of a satellite with fuel onboard is a potential hazard (reason why I wrote about it last year) and authorities were (and are) very quiet about it. Ted's assessment, the only public one to date, helped to put the potential risks involved into proper context.

In the autumn of 2011 we temporarily lost track of IGS 1B because it entered winter invisibility for the Northern hemisphere (where most of our observers are located). Early April this year, it emerged from this winter blackout again. I did a failed attempt to recover it on the evening of April 2, and then Russell Eberst successfully recovered it a day later on the evening of April 3. Since then, I observed it on April 13, 14 and 22 (see video footage above of the April 13 and 14 passes) and other amateurs have observed it as well.

Below is a 35-second integration of video frames from the April 13 video (upper right are tail stars of the Big Dipper):

click image to enlarge

Orbital evolution over the winter blackout

When IGS 1B was lost in the winter blackout in the autumn of 2011, it was in a 453 x 455 km orbit. Since then, it has come down considerably: as of 2012 May 1 it is in a 366 x 368 km orbit, almost 100 km lower (and now below the orbital altitude of the ISS). It is coming down at an increasingly fast speed, as the diagrams below show (based on orbital calculations by Mike McCants, derived from amateur observations which include my observations):

click diagrams to enlarge

 

Current Decay Prediction

Using Alan Pickup's SatEvo software with the current orbit and solar activity, I expect the reentry of IGS 1B to occur somewhere during a window that spans from June until August. As the orbit is evolving fast, it is pertinent that we keep close track of the object in order not to lose it (a few days old elements already results in several minutes uncertainty in pass time).

April 20 Brazilian fireball was NOT the reentry of an Atlas Centaur r/b

A beautiful, slow, long duration, fragmenting fireball was filmed from Brazil in the evening of April 20 (20 April near 20-21h UT). Movies can be seen here and here.

Soon after the apparition, the question came up: meteoric fireball, or a reentry of "space junk"? Based on the visuals of the two movies available, I noted that it looked like a meteoric fireball, not a reentry.

Subsequently, a piece appeared in Universe Today, claiming it was a reentry: that of an Atlas Centaur rocket, #16102, 85-087B, which launched Intelsat 512 in 1985.

That conclusion is simply wrong however. According to USSTRATCOM the object in question decayed 18.5 hours earlier than the fireball, over the western Pacific at 1:23 UTC (20 April) near 18N, 161 E. It reentered nowhere near Brazil. It did pass over northern Brasil on its final pass an hour before reentry, but that would have been at 00:30 UTC, not 20-21 UTC. Moreover, even that pass would have been too much north to see it from the southern Brasilian location where it was filmed from: it would have passed below the horizon as seen from there.

And even if pieces would have survived longer (highly unlikely in this case), these could not have caused a fireball over Brasil 18.5 hours later: the orbital plane of the r/b was wrongly oriented for that. Around the time of the fireball, any surviving objects in the Centaur orbit would not pass over Brasil but much more north, over Mexico and the Caribean (see below. Note: the object was no longer in orbit at that time!).

So, the object that was filmed was most likely a piece of asteroidal debris, a very nice, very slow and very long duration meteor grazing through the upper atmosphere and breaking to pieces.

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!

OT: a multistation filmed meteor from 27 March - some results on the trajectory

In the early morning of March 27, while waiting for a pass of ATV-3, I accidentally filmed a nice meteor from Leiden. As it turned out, the same meteor was also filmed by the meteor surveillance video of Martin Breukers in Hengelo. Hence, we have this approximately mag. -1.3 meteor multistation, allowing triangulation to determine the 3-dimensional atmospheric trajectory and orbit in the solar system. Martin used UFOanalyzer software to process the images and arrive at an atmospheric trajectory. I used my orbital spreadsheet Metorb85 to compute a heliocentric orbit for the meteor.



The movie above shows the meteor footage as obtained from Leiden and Hengelo, plus a 360-degree fly-by around the reconstructed atmospheric trajectory.

The meteor started at 51.745 N, 6.267 E, at 100.4 km altitude. It ended at 51.961 N, 6.707 E and 75.2 km altitude. It had an initial velocity of 27.8 km/s.

Above are two integrated frames images of the meteor, a still image showing the 3D trajectory, and images showing the orbit in the solar system. As the convergence angle between the trails as seen from both video stations was not particularly large, the resulting orbit has some inaccuracy. Nominal orbital element values are:

a = 1.87 AU,
q = 0.450 AU,
e = 0.759,
i = 10.47 deg,
omega = 285.84 deg,
node = 6.696 deg.

The geocentric radiant was near RA 198.20 deg, dec. +4.01 deg, Vgeo 25.67 km/s. The radiant position has some leeway due to the low convergence angle. Hengelo saw the meteor appear in Corona Borealis: Leiden in the Aquila-Sagitta-Delphinus border area.

The Nanosail UNID (10-062X) and Lacrosse 5 brightness variation

When NASA's experimental solar sail Nanosail-D was launched by a Minotaur IV rocket in 2010, it was not the only object this launch brought into space. A number of other, classified objects were part of the same launch.

Now Nanosail-D has decayed, four of these objects (RAX, OREOS, FASTSAT, FAST 1) are being tracked by amateur trackers. One additional object of the launch that is being tracked, however cannot be identified reliably with one of the payloads so far. It could be a payload, or a rocket part from the launch. Dubbed the 2010-062 UNID (10-062X) or "Nanosail UNID" by amateur trackers, it is an object near magnitude 4-5, stable in brightness.

The footage above (WATEC 902H + Canon EF 2.0/35mm lens) shows it passing through the tail of Uma (bright stars are epsilon Uma and delta Uma) on April 1st 2012.

I also filmed Lacrosse 5 (05-016A) that evening. The erratic brightness behaviour of this satellite has featured before on this observing blog. Using footage from the April 1st pass and LiMovie, I reconstructed the brightness curve below, showing a  flare at 20:09:14 UTC and a general quite irregular brightness behaviour with what looks like several small peaks. At 20:09:30 UTC, it appears to do it's typical "disappearance trick" again, dropping rapidly in brightness in just a few seconds of time (note: shadow entry was not before 20:12:00 UTC). The profile is very similar to profiles for Lacrosse 5 which Philip Masding previously obtained, also showing the "disappearing trick" being preceeded by a flare.

click diagram to enlarge

The video footage this curve is based on, is this footage (shot with a 12mm wide-angle lens):



More objects were observed the past few nights. Among them USA 129 (96-072A) and Lacrosse 4, while CCD imagery of Prowler (90-097E)  using the "remote" Rigel telescope of Winer observatory was obtained again as well.

(video) A last view of ESA's ATV-3, with ISS, FIA Radar 1 and an old Russian Soyuz upper stage

click image to enlarge

This morning near 3:39 UTC (5:39 am local time), Europeans could witness the last visible pass of ESA's Space Freighter ATV-3 'Edoardo Amaldi' on its way to the International Space Station (ISS), less than a day away from docking to the ISS in the night of March 28/29.

I watched, photographed and filmed the pass from Leiden: footage shot with the WATEC 902H + 1.4/12mm lens, and a photograph made with the Canon EOS 450D + EF 2.0/35mm lens, can be seen above.

I got a very fine view with more than just the ISS and ATV visible. Just before the ISS became visible around 3:56 UTC a bit of  bright (mag +1) space-debris, an old Russian Soyuz Zenit upper stage crossed the sky (see first seconds of the video above, left in the FOV): 99-039B, the upper stage from the OKEAN-O launch in 1999 [edit 30/03/2012: it is a Zenit rather than a Soyuz r/b - with thanks to Ralf Vandeberg]. Next, the ISS emerged out of earth shadow eclipse near Arcturus, quickly attaining a brightness of -3 to -4. As it moved through Bootes, Corona Borealis, Hercules and into Lyra, the American military satellite FIA Radar 1 (10-046A) came into view, going the opposite direction of the ISS (nicely demonstrating that it is in a rare retrograde orbit, i.e. moves from east to west rather than west to east). As FIA Radar 1 started to descend to the west through Corona Borealis, ESA's ATV-3 came into view, again as a nice and bright naked eye object attaining about mag. 0 to +1. It followed the ISS by almost exactly 3 minutes, just a little bit too much separation alas to image the ATV and it's destination the ISS together. The photograph above (and the video) shows it together with the FIA Radar 1: ATV-3 is moving up, the FIA Radar 1 down! (note: for easthetic reasons, I photoshopped an annoying trail from the aircraft that can be seen in the video, out of the photograph).

The video ends with ATV-3 descending in the east and disappearing behind the roof of our appartement building.

I wish to thank Laurent Arzel (ESA) for providing me with predicted orbital elements with manoeuvres of ATV-3 taken into account. Some web-based satellite prediction services (and surprisingly, the German DLR in a tweet) used "old" elements from the 27th, that lead to erroneous pass times (off by over 5 minutes: these suggested the ATV was leading the ISS by 2.5 minutes, while in reality it was following by 2.5 to 3 minutes!). Thanks to Laurent's elements, I could plan for the correct situation and point some fellow amateur observers to the correct pass times.

With docking less than half a day away as I write this, our Dutch astronaut André Kuipers onboard ISS can look forward to fresh supplies of Dutch cheese soon!

Video: ATV 3 'Edouardo Amaldi', a meteor, and the ISS this morning

This morning I was up early to capture the 3:29 UTC (5:29 am CEST) pass of ESA's space freighter ATV-3 "Edouardo Amaldi". This was just before the start of twilight, so the sky was still dark and several stars can be seen on the video. The video was shot from the center of Leiden town, from the east-facing window of my girlfriend's  appartment. Camera: WATEC 902H + 1.4/12mm lens.

The ATV emerged from Earth shadow at about 38 degrees elevation in the E-SE. Initially mag. +1, it was easily visible by the naked eye, then faded as it descended towards the horizon.

The movie also features footage of a nice 3-second meteor that appeared only a few minutes before the ATV pass: as well as footage of the ISS passing the same sky area about 30 minutes before the ATV.

 Brightest star in the FOV is Altair (alpha Aquila), with the stars of the Arrow just upper left of the center, and stars of the Dolphin near the GPS clock.

Below is also a photographic image, a 6-second exposure with the Canon EOS 450D + EF 2.5/50 mm Macro lens, showing the ATV on the border of Aquila and Sagitta.

click image to enlarge

Note: with a special "thank you!" to Laurent Arzel at ESA ATV CC-flight dynamics for providing timely orbit forecasts!

Brightness variability of the NOSS 3-3 Centaur Upper Stage (with video)

NOSS 3-3 is a pair of US Navy NOSS surveillance satellites launched early 2005. The Centaur upper stage of this NOSS 3-3 launch, NOSS 3-3r (2005-004B) is still orbiting earth as well. And as it does so, it is tumbling.

This tumbling is visible to an observer as a regular variation in brightness. Currently, the rocket stage brightens up every 11.4 seconds.

Below video shows the regular variation in brightness: watch it go from faint to bright to faint etcetera with an 11.4 second period. It is footage from a pass over Leiden which I filmed in the evening of March 22, using the WATEC 902H and a Canon EF 2.0/35 mm lens:

click images to enlarge

Using LiMovie, I extracted the brightness variation from the movie on a frame by frame basis, resulting in the depicted brightness profile above. Note that the tops of the curve are sharp, not rounded. It is a nice saw-tooth pattern. The integrated video frame picture shows the brightness variability nicely too.

Documenting this kind of tumbling behaviour (and notably how it changes over the years) can actually provide some valuable scientific data. A number of amateur observers specialize in these "flash observations", notably my fellow members of the Belgian Working Group Satellites (BWGS).

Footage of ATV 3 passing in morning twilight of March 24

The footage above shows the European cargoship ATV 3 'Edouardo Amaldi' as it passed over Leiden this morning near 4:54 UTC (5:54 am local time), deep in morning twilight (sun at less than -7 degrees elevation only). In the opening shot, Arcturus can be seen top right, and the ATV will appear from behind the chimney-pipe of the roof below.

ATV 3 was bright (magnitude 0 to -1.5) and easily visible by the naked eye. It was somewhat orangish in colour. Once past culmination, I lost it in the twilight glare to the east.

The footage was recorded with a WATEC 902H camera and a 1.4/12mm lens.

I also made some photographic pictures this morning, including this one:

click image to enlarge

ATV 3 was launched by ESA yesterday from Kourou in French Guyana, and is on its way to the International Space Station (ISS) with supplies. I observed it yesterday morning as well, only 22 minutes after launch (see post and pictures here).

Video of Metop-A (06-044A) flaring brilliantly

click images to enlarge

Metop-A (06-044A) is the first operational satellite in a planned series of European meteorological (weather) satellites. It was launched on 19 October 2006. Among satellite observers, it is known for frequently producing very bright flares. These flares occur when the solar panels reflect sunlight to the observer on Earth.

I captured such a flare with my video system yesterday evening: see the video above. The brilliant flare reached mag. -2 at 20:11:11.2 UTC (22 March 2012) and had a FWHM of 6.0 seconds.

Below the video is an integration of all the video frames, and a diagram of the brightness profile (made using LiMovie, wonderful software by Kazuhisa Miyashita). Camera was a WATEC 902H with Canon EF 2.0/35mm lens.

My GPS time-inserter unfortunately lost signal about a minute before the flare - hence why the display says "Bad GPS" in the video. Fortunately, in the preceding minutes I had recorded enough of time-signal in the video to extrapolate the time using the video frame rate. Hence, I am quite confident about the accuracy of the brightness profile.

Newly launched ATV 3 cargoship in twilight

This morning at 4:34 UTC, the European Space Agency ESA launched the third Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) cargoship, ATV 3 "Edouardo Amaldi", from Kourou in French Guyana, bringing supplies to the International Space Station.

click images to enlarge

Only 22 minutes later, around 4:56 UTC (5:56 am local time), it made a pass visible from Europe. The ATV was still connected to the Ariane upper stage at that moment. As seen from Leiden, it was a low pass at a maximum elevation of 24 degrees in the S-SE, and in deep twilight: sun at -7 degrees altitude.

Nevertheless it was easily visible by the naked eye around culmination, as a fast and steady mag. 0 to -1 object moving against a bright blue twilight background. The picture above is a 4-second exposure taken with the Canon EOS 450D + EF 2.8/24mm lens, 400 ISO.

Note added 24/03/2012: More observations from following nights, including video of a pass on the 24th, available here.

SAR Lupe 4 and USA 129 (pass footage)

Like a few days ago, I used the WATEC 902H video camera  yesterday evening to film a pass of  USA 129.

Near 19:41:30 UTC (21 March), the same 10-degree wide FOV first saw the German military Radar satellite SAR Lupe 4 (08-014A) pass and then, only some 10 seconds later, the American KH-12 Keyhole optical reconnaissance satellite USA 129 (96-072A). Below is the resulting footage:



The FOV is about 10 degrees wide, and the two brightest stars are delta and gamma Uma in the Big Dipper. The lens used was a Canon EF 2.0/35mm lens. The camera is a WATEC 902H. Time insert is done by a GPS time inserter.

Footage of a pass of the KH-12 Keyhole optical reconnaissance satellite USA 129

Spring is a time when not only some birds appear out of their winter hiding, but some satellites emerge from winter darkness as well. Among them the evening plane KH-12 "Improved Crystal" Keyhole satellites.

The footage above shows one of these evening plane KH-12 Keyholes, USA 129 (96-072A), the oldest one still in orbit. The footage was shot by me in the evening of Monday 19 March, from my observatory in Leiden. The star field is a part of the tail of the Big Dipper: epsilon Uma at lower left and delta Uma at upper left. A WATEC 902H camera, GPS time inserter and Canon EF 2.0/35mm lens were used.

USA 129 was quite bright during this pass and well visible by the naked eye: initially near magnitude zero in Leo, then near magnitude +2.5 once culminating near Uma (the segment of footage shows it while it was near +2.5.)

The Keyholes are optical reconnaissance satellites, resembling Hubble Space Telescopes pointing to Earth surface. They image the earth with a resolution that is believed to be in the order of 10 centimeters (about 4 inch). Four of them are in orbit currently: USA 129 imaged above, USA 161, USA 186 and USA 224. USA 186 is an evening plane Keyhole just like USA 129: the other two are midnight plane Keyholes. On my 52 degree latitude, the evening plane Keyholes start to make visible evening passes in March, the midnight plane Keyholes during the late spring and summer (starting April-May).

MiTEx 1, AEHF 1 and Prowler

Weather conditions have not been too well lately. In the evening of March 14, I could do some imaging from Leiden, albeit under hazy skies. The relatively bright geostationary SIGINT Mentor 2 (98-029A) was the target.

In addition, I used a "remote" telescope, the 37-cm F14 Rigel Cassegrain of Winer Observatory (MPC 587) to image a few geostationary objects over US longitudes. Targets were (below images from top to bottom) the communication satellite AEHF 1 (10-039A), and the enigmatic objects MiTEx 1 (06-024A) and Prowler (90-097A).

click image to enlarge

AEHF 1 (aka USA 214) is the first of the Advanced Extremely High Frequency communication satellites that should replace the Milstar system. Because one of its onboard rocket boosters failed, the satellite had to be brought from GTO to its geostationary destination using smaller thrusters designed for station keeping, a procedure which took over a year.

This was the first time I imaged AEHF 1.

Prowler and MiTEx 1 are both enigmatic objects. Prowler's unique story has been discussed here before. MiTEx 1 (USA 187)  is an enigmatic object that has some connection to the Prowler legacy. Like Prowler presumably was, it was designed to inspect other satellites. Two MiTEx satellites were launched (in the same launch in 2006), MiTEx 1 and 2. They were used to inspect, amongst others, the failed DSP satellite DSP-23 in 2009. I imaged MiTEx 2 before, this was the first time I also imaged MiTEx 1.

André Kuipers talking from Space

This morning near 11:14 local time (10:14 UTC), Dutch astronaut André Kuipers onboard the ISS had a radio talk with a school class in Belgium on 145.800 MHz. From Leiden, I listened in using my old scanner radio and a homebrew dipole antenna (two hardware store 50 cm metal rods connected to a coax cable). Below is a recording of part of the reception (voice is André Kuipers, in Dutch):


The school class in question was a class from primary school De Regenboog in Bree, Belgium.

It is always cool to directly hear astronauts from Space. I listened in on André Kuipers talking from space before during his 2004 mission and several times have picked up communications between ISS astronauts and Russian ground stations in the past. You don't need fancy equipment for that: a normal scanner-radio and the kind of simple homebrew antenna I use will do. I use an old second-hand Realistic Pro 2042 receiver and a dipole antenna made out of a 1 meter M5 rod from the hardware store that I sawed in to 50 cm halfs, which are connected to the coax cable. Very simple but it works! See below image (cat is vital for good reception ;-p  )

Space debris lands in Brazil village

Through Carlos Bella on the satobs mailing list, news broke today that an object which almost certainly is space-debris crashed in the Brazilian village of Anapurus on February 22, 2012, near 6 am local time (9 UTC). It landed about 6 yards from a house and damaged trees upon impact.

Photo's of the object can be see here.They show a spherical object that strongly resembles a spherical rocket fuel cell (tank) or a Helium pressurization tank. These are the most resistent objects among space debris and often involved in reported cases of space-debris reaching earth surface.

Ted Molczan quickly noted that date, time and location correspond well to the re-entry of 1997-016C, an Ariane 44L rocket stage from the launch of two geostationary satellites, Thaicom 3 and Bsat-1A, on 17 April 1997.

The Ariane 44L r/b in question re-entered at 9:09 UTC +/- 1 min on 22 February 2012, near 4 S, 312 E. This corresponds well with the time and location of the Anapurus event (3.7 S, 317 E). Anapurus is located right on the re-entry track and was passed within a minute of the estimated re-entry time (movement of the r/b was from West to East, i.e. to the right in the map):

click map to enlarge

Lacrosse 5

For those arriving here through the link with Thierry's imaging of Lacrosse 5 on Spaceweather: a discussion of the Lacrosse 5 "disappearance trick" including a video of such an event, can be found here.