Mayak observed, the bright new light in the sky - not !

[SilverAstro]

Just caught a pass of Mayak at 01:26 * fitting the path and timings predicted on Heavens above, very underwhelming at less than the mag1.25 of Deneb  , much less bright than ISS was a bit earlier.

EDIT * 01:26BST 23-07-17

EDIT2 now that I have my bearings in Stellarium :-  first picked up (rising above my trees) in Draco when it was a bit brighter ( but not a lot) than gammaDraco 2.2 in my Stellarium but Wiki gives it 2.4? So half-way betwix that and Deneb puts it in the region of mag1.5 or less.

Sadly not recorded on camera due to it being set on ISO100 when it should have been 1600 doh !

EDIT3 HeavensAbove front page is doubting the veracity of "Object3" being Mayak. It would be interesting to see predictions/plots of other possibilities from that launch. I was watching from about 5mins before till about 5mins after and saw nothing else.

EDIT4 and just for good measure Cosmos1743 observed at 2:37bst passing close by zetaCas as predicted about mag3 now time for bed !

[MarsG76]

Sounds about right... Form the beginning I found it hard to believe that any nation other than north kokrea would want to launch something that would reflect full moon amount of light back to earth, potentially crippling astronomical observations... There would be a major outcry...

I hope that I didn't just jinx it and we don't start to see a bright man made thing in the sky from now....

[Dave In Vermont]

The DPRK has 2 satellites up there. One doesn't do anything, seems to be out-of-control. The KMS 4 has been orbitting successfully since Feb. 2016 I think. I think it's only purpose is to scare people. Seems to be working quite well.

Here's the latest article I've found on Maniac (Mayak):

New Satellite ‘Mayak’ Might Light Up the Sky.pdf

Bah!

Dave

 

 

[SilverAstro]

Much discussion already about the rectitude or otherwise of this thing here :- https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/295782-a-bright-idea-not/

Reports elsewhere are about it being "not naked eye", or "not seen" , until one lone report from Germany of it being "quite bright".

If I had known there was so much doubt about its identity I would have made more effort to be more precise about my obs.

( I was also a bit distracted by my tripod collapsing one leg and falling over luckily I had just taken the camera off it ! )

 

[SilverAstro]

10 hours ago, SilverAstro said:

the veracity of "Object3" being Mayak.

  Object 3    = Object F

[bejay1957]

Some suggestion the sails/reflectors have yet to, or have failed to, deploy?

http://www.popastro.com/news/newsdetail.php?id_nw=549

[SilverAstro]

10 hours ago, bejay1957 said:

 or have failed to, deploy?

or maybe all the right deployment movements but not necessarily in the right order  /Morecambe and Wise

Sky is clearing, we may get another chance tonight fingers-etc, first op. very low(for us westerners) in the east just before midnight.

[rockettsue]

on the 22nd July, after 11.p.m or thereabouts  going from south to north my husband said he saw the russian satellite. He said it was brighter than jupiter. He didn't know what it was not being an astrologer. I told him about the satellite so he said he thinks it could have been that. We saw the ISS last night but no sign of the other satellite. He said the ISS looked smaller than the object he had seen. Ive no idea if he had seen the real thing or not.  We are in Andalucia southern Spain.

[SilverAstro]

33 minutes ago, rockettsue said:

on the 22nd July, after 11.p.m or thereabouts  going from south to north my husband said he saw the russian satellite. He said it was brighter than jupiter.

Thanks for the very interesting report,

cant think of anything else that would (should) be that bright, other than an Iridium flare, so it could have been Mayak, which would mean the ObjectF that HA are using as Mayak would not be it ! Because ObjectF was predicted for 2:26am   BST    EDIT UTC+2  in S Spain that night (morning of 23rd) ,  [what time zone are you on down there?] , rising in the north heading south to eclipse near Polaris.

The plot thickens

 

[SilverAstro]

1 minute ago, SilverAstro said:

was predicted for 2:26am   BST  in S Spain that night (morning of 23rd) ,
 

Oooops HA changed my time zone when I moved south so that would be 2:26UTC+2 (forCET?) ie your local time.

[Mr niall]

Have you seen the size of it though its not very big, it looks like an actual replica of the tent I took to  Leeds Festival in 2001 (that didnt end well either come to think of it - did see lots of pretty lights in the sky though, among other things....)

[Dave In Vermont]

58 minutes ago, rockettsue said:

..... He didn't know what it was not being an astrologer. I told him about the satellite so he said he thinks it could have been that. We saw the ISS last night but no sign of the other satellite. He said the ISS looked smaller than the object he had seen. Ive no idea if he had seen the real thing or not.  We are in Andalucia southern Spain.

...astronomer, please! In English, an 'astrologer' is something very different.

About as different as a surgeon is from a butcher! Or, at least, one hopes!

I found Mayak, listed as 2017-042F, in Previsat listed under the 'tle-new' section. This will give us predictions of passes - if we wish to see just how bad this thing is

Dave

[SilverAstro]

not very big and should be flashing,, not read anything about it being stabilised  and even if it was it would be expected to flare like an Iridium panel. ( how big are those ?? )

Yes I spotted that but never mind Dave worse mistakes in the sky at the mo. Copernicus wouldnt be where he is today without them

[SilverAstro]

Butchers Surgeons Alchemists, all the same once over, we are just standing on their shoulders

[SilverAstro]

@rockettsue Ive been looking at the HA predictions for that evening and there is nothing else that bright (mag1.1 for the Chinese Tiangong at about 10:45 is the closest) for your location, so it could still be a case of mistaken identity with ObjectF not being it ! Keep watching !!

I've not yet of course, checked for Iridium flares which would be very specific to your exact location give or take a few km.

[bejay1957]

7 hours ago, rockettsue said:

on the 22nd July, after 11.p.m or thereabouts  going from south to north my husband said he saw the russian satellite. He said it was brighter than jupiter. He didn't know what it was not being an astrologer. I told him about the satellite so he said he thinks it could have been that. We saw the ISS last night but no sign of the other satellite. He said the ISS looked smaller than the object he had seen. Ive no idea if he had seen the real thing or not.  We are in Andalucia southern Spain.

If heavensabove has correct orbits, that would have been going in the wrong direction for Mayak - only showing NE>SE pass for that time in the evening

[SilverAstro]

52 minutes ago, bejay1957 said:

If heavensabove has correct orbits,

eggsarkely the problem ! Let alone the correct object from the 70+ (cubesats etc) from that Kanupus launch! they admit it ! HA are not yet sure and welcome other (perplexing) obs, it is not yet shut&dusted

so more obs (or null obs) are needed

[bejay1957]

Well, picked up something on the predicted path just after midnight this morning, though notably dimmer than the ISS a little later - murky seeing wasn't helping observation

[SilverAstro]

Thanks, interesting,

That seems to be the story of the mo. ! A big non-event considering the howls of (pre)anguish. I have suggested to ChrisP(HA) that perhaps we should be monitoring the other (or some of) 70odd+ objects launched along with the primary Kanopus,,, in case it aint ObjectF,  but nowt so far !

[rockettsue]

Thanks all. Will tell my astrologer (lol) to look again!  (He was a metallurgist not a sky watcher anyway in his pre-old age years so I excuse him).  Sorry about the astros mix up - think I must have had too much vino tinto the night of that post!

[SilverAstro]

Dr Kelso ( of CelesTrak ) is saying that there has been no significant change (yet, as would be expected) in the TLE for Object F.

This would be consistant with either : ObjectF/Mayak has not deployed yet  OR ObjectF is not Mayak !

the plot remains thickening

 

[SilverAstro]

Finally, confirmation that Mayak failed to deploy, this from the home site :-

http://press.cosmomayak.ru/page1225122.html

Quote ",,,, MAYAK satellite didn't manage to unfold its sun reflector pyramid. "

"After calculating flight's route of all satellites, launched by Soyuz-2.1a, we made the conclusion that MAYAK is supposed to fail in unfolding of the reflector into working position."

EDIT : and confirmed on Heavens Above front page  http://www.heavens-above.com

[SilverAstro]

So I suppose there is now yet more 'junk in space'

As I understand the design/program proposals it was to be deorbited in a few months by virtue of its low orbit and consequent drag on the extended sail. (ref two posts previous) There is no word on what the lifetime of the undeployed cubesat will be. At least, if there is I've not yet found it !

[Erla]

Ok, I'll take one for the team. There's a what looks like official app tracking it and it should be above horizon for me in 35 min. 

I feel rather sketchy installing it, in this day and age, but since I'm not a general or politician nor I do banking on the phone-  what a heck. Let's wait a bit and see  the app is called CosmoMAYAK, btw.

[Dave In Vermont]

Happy Hunting, Erla! Go bag that Bad-Boy!

Or not - but please do bring us a report on this "THING from OUTER SPACE!" <play Eeeerie music here>

Dave