Wednesday, November 10, 2010

A week and a half of sessions

This is gonna be a long post containing 43 observations (including observation #200). Sorry. I just haven't had time to get them in as I felt that REAL news like Halloween n Record Shows were more important. I'll try to only really go into detail for objects that I've not seen before. Once can only hear about Helios 1 or Resurs 1-4 so many times.

This post covers Oct 31 morning (technically a repeat) through Nov 10th (this evening). I had a killer session on Nov 1st with 18 objects. For this evening (Nov 10th), I told myself I was only gonna go out for an old rocket booster from 1974 but then I suckered myself to go outside to catch the ISS, Resurs 1-4 and a 1971 ASTEX satellite. Of the 7 I planned, I only missed one. Not bad.

Now... let the games begin!!!

Here's the time-line for the morning and evening of:
Date: 31-Oct-2010 Sunday


7:17 AM - Cosmos 2237 Rocket - 2.9 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1993-016-B
This object is a Zenit-2 rocket body which was used to launch the Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite, Kosmos 2237. This is my third sighting for this one.

7:23 PM - Shijian6-3 LMr - 3.3 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2008-053-C
This is my second sighting of this Long March 4B rocket body used to launch Shi Jian 6E and 6F satellites.

7:31 PM - Cosmos 1400 Rocket - 3.5 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1982-079-B
This is my first sighting of this Vostok-2M. This rocket was used to launch Kosmos 1400, a Russian Tselina-D ELINT satellite, in the year 1982.

7:33 PM - Shijian 7 LM Rocket - 3.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2005-024-B
This is my third sighting of this Chinese Long March 2D rocket used to launch the Shijian 7 experimental satellite

7:37 PM - Meteor 1-20 Rocket - 5.7 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1974-099-B
This is my first sighting of this Vostok-2M which was used by the Russians to put up the twentieth Meteor 1 meteorological satellite in 1974.

7:45 PM - Cosmos 1408 - 2.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1982-092-A
This is my second sighting of Kosmos 1408, a Russian Tselina-D ELINT satellite.




Here's the time-line for evening of:
Date: 1-Nov-2010 Monday


7:13 PM - AMC 9 BrzTank - 4.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2003-024-B
This is my first sighting of this Briz-M upper stage from a Proton-M rocket. It was used to launch AMC 9, a geostationary communications satellite that provides direct-to-home digital TV to the United States and Canada.

7:25 PM - ISS - -1.3 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-067-A
This is my fifth sighting of the International Space Station.

7:28 PM - Cosmos 44 Rocket - 3.4 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1964-053-B
This is my first sighting of this Vostok-2M which was used by the Russians in 1964 to put up Kosmos 44, an experimental meteorological satellite. If you remember, Kosmos 44 was one of the really old objects I was trying to see... and I was successful on Oct 7th 2010.

7:33 PM - Cosmos 1400 Rocket - 3.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1982-079-B
This is my second sighting (and second night in a row) of this Vostok-2M rocket.

7:34 PM - Helios 1B - 3.7 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1999-064-A
This is my fifth sighting of Helios 1B, a French photo-recon satellite.

7:36 PM - Meteor 2-21 Rocket - 5.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1993-055-C
This is my first sighting of this Tsyklon-3 rocket which was used by the Russians to deploy the 21st (and last) Meteor 2 meteorological satellite. I guess Meteor 2-21 was a bit distinctive due to its unique retroreflector array. Read up at the link. It's a bit too complex to try to explain here. :)

7:45 PM - NOAA 1 Rocket - 5.5 Magnitude (NUMBER 200!!!)
Int'l Designator: 1970-106-B
THIS IS MY 200th SIGHTING! It is fitting that this object would be both an older object (from 1970) and also be the first time seeing it. This object is a Delta N6 rocket body. Here is another pic of the Delta N6. This rocket was used to launch two satellite. The first NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) satellite (also known as ITOS A) was used to provide infrared and visual observations of earth cloud cover for use in weather forecasting. The second was CEP 1 (CEPE) which was an experiment piggybacked onto the second stage of the Delta N6 and stupid electron density, temperature and ion current. The Delta N6 was used only 3 times, and all three times it was used for ITOS satellites.

7:38 PM - Cosmos 1408 - 2.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1982-092-A
This is my third sighting of Kosmos 1408, a Russian Tselina-D ELINT satellite.

7:50 PM - Lacrosse 5 - 1.8 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2005-016-A
This is my sixth sighting of the NRO U.S. recon satellite, Lacrosse 5.

7:57 PM - Cosmos 2263 Rocket - 2.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1993-059-B
This is my first sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body. It was used to launch Kosmos 2263, a Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite.

7:58 PM - Cosmos 1867 - 3.7 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1987-060-A
This is my first sighting of Kosmos 1867. This satellite was a RORSAT (Radar Ocean Reconnaissance SATellite) which was used to search the oceans for naval and merchant ships. It is powered by a TOPAZ 1 nuclear reactor. It also contained a Hall effect (ion) thruster.

8:01 PM - Cryosat 2 Rocket - 5.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2010-013-B
This is my first sighting for this Russian Dnepr-1 rocket. The Dnepr-1 is a converted Russian ICBM. This rocket was used to put the second CryoSat satellite into orbit. The CryoSat satellites use radar to determine the thickness of the polar ice sheets. The launch of the first CryoSat satellite failed use to a programmatic error in the launch vehicle (which was a Rokot, another re-purposed ICBM, not a dnept-1).

8:04 PM - Skymed 2 - 3.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2007-059-A
This is my second sighting of the COSMO-SkyMed 2 Italian earth observation satellite.

8:04 PM - IRAS Rocket - 4.4 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1983-004-B
This is my second sighting of this Delta 3910 rocket that was used to put the IRAS telescope into orbit.

8:06 PM - Cosmos 1315 Rocket - 3.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1981-103-B
This is my second sighting of this Vostok-2M rocket body which was used to launch Kosmos 1315, a Russian ELINT Tselina-D satellite.

8:21 PM - Tansuo 1 LM2r - 2.8 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2004-012-C
This is my ninth sighting of this Long March 2C rocket body. It was used to launch the Tansuo 1 satellite which was capable stereo imaging.

8:25 PM - Resurs 1-4 Rocket - 2.0 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-043-G
This is my 14th sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body.

8:25 PM - Meteor 3-6 - 5.9 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1994-003-A
This is my first sighting of Meteor 3-6, a Russian meteorological satellite.




Here's the time-line for morning of:
Date: 3-Nov-2010 Wednesday


7:01 AM - Cosmos 2026 Rocket - 4.1 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1989-042-B
This is my first sighting of this Kosmos-3M rocket which was used to launch the Russian Kosmos 2026 which, amazingly enough _not_ an ELINT satellite. Kosmos 2026 was a Parus satellite, which are used for communications and navigation. There have been 99 Parus satellites launched since Kosmos 700 in 1974 (which is still in orbit, btw).

7:04 AM - shooting star - 5.0 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: nope
I believe this to be just one of those random shooting stars, not affiliated with any specific meteor shower. Or it could just be some space junk burning up in the atmosphere.




Here's the time-line for morning of:
Date: 7-Nov-2010 Sunday

6:21 AM - Cosmos 2406 Rocket - 3.1 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2004-021-B
This is my first sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body which was used to launch Kosmos 2406, a Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite.




Here's the time-line for evening of:
Date: 8-Nov-2010 Monday

I remember this evening. In my haste, I mistaken wrote down a bunch of satellites... unfortunately my military time brain was off and I picked up 18:00hr (6PM) satellites when I should have been picking up 19:00 (7PM) satellites. In a 1/2 hour I managed to see one satellite by chance.

7:33 PM - Helios 1B - 3.3 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1999-064-A
This is my sixth sighting of Helios 1B, a French photo-recon satellite.




Here's the time-line for evening of:
Date: 9-Nov-2010 Tuesday


6:02 PM - Envisat Ari5 Rocket - 2.9 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2002-009-B
This is my first sighting of this Ariane 5 rocket body. This rocket was used to launch Envisat (Environmental Satellite) which is a European Space Agency (ESA) earth observation satellite. It is also the largest earth observation satellite ever put into orbit. It's got cool stuff on it. However, we should be focusing on the Ariane 5 rocket which is used to put objects into GTO (geostationary transfer orbit) or LEO (low earth orbit). It consists of a main motor which used liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen and two solid rocket boosters.

6:44 PM - Cosmos 1606 - 2.7 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1984-111-A
This is my first sighting of Kosmos 1606, a Russian Tselina-D ELINT satellite.

6:46 PM - ISS - -1.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-067-A
This is my sixth sighting of the International Space Station.

6:55 PM - Cosmos 2278 Rocket - 2.7 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1994-023-B
This is my first sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body which launched Kosmos 2278, a Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite.

6:58 PM - Iridium 4 Dl Rocket - 3.5 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1997-020-F
This is my first sighting of this Delta 7920-10C rocket body. It was used to put the Iridium 4 satellite into orbit. The Delta 7920-10C is in the Delta II rocket family. The numbering system is explained on the wiki page.

7:00 PM - Cosmos 2082 Rocket - 2.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1990-046-B
This is my first sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body which was used to launch Kosmos 2082, a Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite.

7:04 PM - Skymed 1 - 2.6 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2007-023-A
This is my fifth sighting of COSMO-Skymed 1, an Italian earth observation satellite.

7:21 AM - shooting star - 4.0 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: nope
Just a shooting star or piece of space junk burning up.

7:30 PM - Resurs 1-4 Rocket - 1.9 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-043-G
This is my 15th sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body. Ol' faithful!




Here's the time-line for evening of:
Date: 10-Nov-2010 Wednesday


6:23 PM - Cosmos 660 Rocket - 1.9 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1974-044-B
This was the only object I was planning on seeing on November 10th, however I ended up running downstairs and writing a few more down. This is my first time seeing this Kosmos-3M rocket body which, in 1974, launched the first Russian Taifun-1/Vektor satellite which was a radar calibration target.

6:46 PM - Cosmos 2082 Rocket - 2.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1990-046-B
This is my second sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body which put Kosmos 2082, a Russian Tselina-2 ELINT satellite into orbit.

6:55 PM - Inmarsat4-F3Tk - 3.4 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 2008-039-B
This is my first sighting of this Briz-M tank. This particular second stage launched the Inmarsat-4 F3 satellite, owned by British telecom company Inmarsat, which is used in broadband communications.

6:57 PM - ASTEX - 3.3 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1971-089-A
This is my first sighting of the ASTEX (Advanced Space Technology Experiment) satellite which was designed to test advanced development payloads. Read more at the link for lots of stuff that I couldn't quite grasp since I'm getting tired. I can tell you that it was launched in 1971 but ended up killing itself when it failed to heed a 'stop transmission' command and the darn thing ended up transmitting itself to death.

7:06 PM - Resurs 1-4 Rocket - 2.2 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-043-G
This is my 16th sighting of this Zenit-2 rocket body.

7:11 PM - ISS - -1.5 Magnitude
Int'l Designator: 1998-067-A
This is my 7th sighting of the International Space Station.

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