Asteroid Occultations

[Black Shuck]

Received from BAA. Might be especially interesting for our South East UK members?

Cheers

Bill£

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BAA electronic bulletin No. 00330 http://www.britastro.org/

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Dear Observer,

Predictions of stellar occultations by asteroids are becoming more accurate

and more frequent as time goes on. This month we have the unusual occurence

of TWO occultations potentially visible from the UK on the SAME EVENING,

Friday March 07.

The formal track of both shadows cross Devon but given the large positional

uncertainties it means that most folk in England and Wales will have a small

chance (5-10%) of seeing a positive event.

The details are:

At 20:54 UT, asteroid 18996 (2000 RR53) occults star TYC 0148 0778 ( V=10.8 )

in Monoceros for a max duration of about 4 seconds. The asteroid is about

21 km across. Observers

Please observe the star at least between 20:51 and 20:57 UT (Position RA

06h51m12s, Dec +00d51'34").

More information and a map showing the track is available (courtesy of the

European Asteroid Occultation Network) at:

http://astrosurf.com/eaon/Cartes/03%20March/07_2000%20RR53.htm

At 23:01 UT, asteroid 3273 Drukar occults star TYC 1808 0404 (V=10.9) in

Taurus for a max duration of about 2 seconds. The asteroid is about 33 km

across. Observers in Ireland and France may also witness a positive event.

Please observe the star at least between 22:59 and 23:03 UT (Position RA

03h51m29s, Dec +27d27'48").

More information and a map showing the track is available (courtesy of the

European Asteroid Occultation Network) at:

http://astrosurf.com/eaon/Cartes/03%20March/07_drukar.htm

Both events take place with the stars at reasonable altitudes as seen from

the UK, and the weather forecast shows that we may very well have clear

skies (i.e. a gap between fronts approaching from the west).

Richard Miles

Asteroids and Remote Planets Section