Twin Satalites??

[Jaffa007]

Hi,

Did anyone else see the tandum set of satalites last night?

Traveling South West to North East @ 23:55 last night.

At first I thought I was seeing things, then my brain kicked in and told me, no the less brighter of the three was the satalite passing two bright stars . Realised then that no I was right and that the two bright opjects were the ones moving .

Been on Starry Night, but no satalites shown. I think I remember another post in the past about these being a set of three in sync, triangle formation, with each other.....???

Help??

[calibos]

Saw a pair of Satellites in formation fly past Jupiter in the FOV of my 15x70 Bino's the other night

[acey]

I've seen a threesome in the past. Try checking here:

Heavens-Above Home Page

[Talitha]

Hi James, they're NOSS satellites (Naval Ocean Surveillance System).

NOSS Double and Triple Satellite Formations

[David Galvin]

As the good lady says, NOSS. I think that you can find some video on YouTube.

[Jaffa007]

Thanks Talitha, that's great

...... is there a reason then why they don't show up on the Starry Night program, if they've been de-classified ???

[crovax]

Yeah, I was trying to find them in Starry Night without any luck too. The same goes for Heavens-Above. Where can we check their location to observe this interesting thing?

[acey]

There'll be a magnitude limit on Starry Night and from what I can remember, these duos and triplets aren't very bright. I think Heavens Above has a default mag limit but you can search for fainter objects.

[Jaffa007]

Just checked S.N. it's dimmist setting is 35.0 mag.

Checked H.Above and they do down to 4.5 mag. But the names & times didn't match up, that's if I was of course looking in the right place!?!?!

Going from the NOSS page [above link] the Sat's are commanly called Poppy 7 or NOSS, neither apear in S.N.

Still searching for predictions, names, when to see again

Anything above is not gospol, so correct me if wrong...... it won't be the first time

[acey]

Just checked S.N. it's dimmist setting is 35.0 mag.

Er, check again. The Hubble Deep Field could only reach mag 29. I'm guessing you meant 3.5.

[Jaffa007]

told you I'd be wrong somewhere, thanks mate

[David Galvin]

According to Calsky, there was a pass of several Noss at the time stated, This was for 21/7/09 at 23:55 BST.

23h55m51s NOSS 3-4 (A)

(31701 2007-027-A)

→Ground track →Star chart Appears 23h44m54s 7.1mag az:225.3° SW horizon

Culmination 23h54m43s 4.5mag az:316.9° NW h:89.3°

distance: 1094.4km height above Earth: 1094.4km elevation of sun: -14°

Disappears 0h04m12s 7.9mag az: 48.9° NE horizon

23h56m31s NOSS 2-3 ©

(23908 1996-029-C)

→Ground track →Star chart Appears 23h48m09s 7.8mag az:217.3° SW horizon

Culmination 23h56m31s 5.1mag az:132.2° SE h:74.6°

distance: 1013.1km height above Earth: 981.7km elevation of sun: -14°

Disappears 0h06m07s 9.0mag az: 48.1° NE horizon

23h56m39s NOSS 2-3 (E)

(23936 1996-029-E)

→Ground track →Star chart Appears 23h48m18s 7.8mag az:217.0° SW horizon

Culmination 23h56m39s 5.1mag az:132.0° SE h:74.1°

distance: 1015.0km height above Earth: 981.5km elevation of sun: -14°

Disappears 0h06m16s 9.0mag az: 48.0° NE horizon

I am not sure which one you may have seen as they all appear to be travelling SW to NE. Do you recall which constellations they passed through?

I suggest that you should log into Calsky and enter your details. You can then get predictions for rise and set times, passes for many objects such as Sun, Moon, Planets, ISS,and shuttle.

Another interesting site is http://www.kfetter.com/

[Talitha]

You're welcome, James.

To get the listings of the NOSS satellites in Heavens Above, look under the Satellites section and click on the link that says 'select'. When the next page is generated, go to the third text box (Satellite name) and type in NOSS% for a list of the first and second generation satellites, or USA% for a list of the third generation satellites.

[Jaffa007]

Thanks David, that's a great site!

Will check again about which constallationi they passed through, but just knowing what it was and where to find them again [if I can] will do for me.

Thanks Talitha for the correct Satellite names.

[crovax]

Wow, I now see it on heavens-above, thanks! I did notice that page before but I've been trying "NOSS" and "NOSS*" instead of "NOSS%"and that's why I ended up without any results.

Anyway the magnitude of that sattelites seem to be too faint for me so I guess won't even try to find them.

[Jaffa007]

Wow, I now see it on heavens-above, thanks! I did notice that page before but I've been trying "NOSS" and "NOSS*" instead of "NOSS%"and that's why I ended up without any results.

Anyway the magnitude of that sattelites seem to be too faint for me so I guess won't even try to find them.

Mate, these two I saw were as bright as the ISS as they rose up .

[crovax]

Weird, all NOSS sattelites that I've checked on heavens-above range from 5 to 8 Mag. May be you've just seen normal sattelites? Not long ago I saw two very bright sattelites together and according to Starry Night that were ISS followed by Progress-M (if I remember correctly).

[Jaffa007]

Had already checked the times for the ISS so knew it was that . It's pass was 22:57 over me. So am inclined to go with the NOSS sat's, as they were tandum flying formation.

Yeah, read bout the 5 to 8 Mag. As they rose up toward the zenith, they did drop quiet rapidly to almost nothing in brightness, as you'd expect with satalites passing into the Earth's shadow.