(meteorobs) Fireball? Bootids? June 26, 2004

[Marco Langbroek]

Hello Kevin, Lew,

This too is definitely an observation of the decay of 1992-088E, a part of a
Russian rocket, on the night of 26-27 June (2:53 UTC, wich is about 22:54
EDST if I am not mistaken. So not June Bootids.

Kevin, you can find reports of several sightings of this decay on A/CC:
http://www.hohmanntransfer.com/mn/0407/01.htm#bits
and in the June and July archives of the satobs list:
http://www.satobs.org/seesat/index.html
...and on meteorbs
http://www.meteorobs.org
including several forwards by Cathy Hall from the RASCAL list.

It concerned the decay of an approximately 1 meter large auxiliary motor
separated from a rocket stage used to launch the russian Cosmos 2224
satellite in 1992. Here's the decay report from NASA Orbital Information
Group:

- Marco

Query time: 2004/06/27 16:37:59

                      Object Order: Predicted Decay Date


Decay: Decay Time          N Lat  E Long       RCS
CatNo Intl. Desig. Source Common Name                          Prepared
----- ------------ ------ ------------------------- -------------------

Decay: 2004/06/27 02:51:00   46.3  258.4    0.9548
22273 1992-088E    CIS    SL-12 R/B(AUX MOTOR)      2004/06/27 03:43:00


PREPARATION DATE TIME:  270343ZJUN04
1.  22273/1992-088E   /SL-12 R/B(AUX MOTOR)    /ROCKET BODY/ CIS
2.  17 DEC 1992
3.  REV  10105/DESCENDING/27 JUN 0251Z
4.  46.3 DEG N   258.4 DEG E
5.  DECAY WINDOW IS PLUS OR MINUS    01 MINUTES.
6.  INCLINATION  046.6 DEGREES.
TRAJECTORY PRIOR TO DECAY (DEG):
D/TIME 179/0136Z    179/0151Z    179/0206Z    179/0221Z    179/0236Z
LAT.        8.5        -34.0        -42.9         -6.1         36.0
E LONG    349.2        032.9        108.6        160.1        205.1
7.  FINAL REPORT.
.

------
Dr Marco Langbroek
Leiden, the Netherlands
52.15896 N, 4.48884 E (WGS 84)

e-mail: meteorites at dmsweb.org
website: http://home.wanadoo.nl/marco.langbroek
weblog: http://home.wanadoo.nl/marco.langbroek/iss_log.html
------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kevin Kesler (via Lew Gramer)" <kesler.kevin at ensco.com>
To: <meteorobs at meteorobs.org>
Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 6:45 PM
Subject: (meteorobs) Fireball? Bootids? June 26, 2004


>
> June 26, 2004  McElhattan, PA
>
> I was attending a Blue Grass Festival ( Smoke Country Jam) in
> McElhattan in central PA.  Sometime between 9 pm and 11pm ( I am sorry
> I cannot be more precise) I saw what appeared at first to be a
> formation of 5 to 6 planes.  The objects appeared from the Northwest
> travelling to the south east, They took approximately 10 seconds to
> cross the sky.  As the objects passed overhead they began to breakup
> into brighter, short lived objects.
>
> When I saw the objects I began to point and shout for everyone to look
> up.  Hundreds of people saw the display.  The next morning their were
> rumors at the festival of space junk causing the display.  After
> hearing and seeing no news reports of spectacular space junk I checked
> the Internet when I returned home.  I found that he time was right for
> the Bootids which are characterized by relatively slow moving and
> sometimes spectacular displays.
>
> I am curious if others saw similar displays this year or if we just
> got lucky.
>
> Thanks, Kevin Kesler
> (Please post replies to the web site)
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