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From: Nick Balaskas <nikolaos@yorku.ca>
Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 15:49:27 -0800 (Eastern standard time)
Fwd Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1998 17:29:33 -0500
Subject: Re: Sighting In Pretoria, South Africa


>Date: Mon, 02 Nov 1998 16:10:58 +0200
>From: Jakes Louw <louwje@telkom.co.za>
>To: updates@globalserve.net
>Subject: Sighting in Pretoria, South Africa

>To follow on from the Virginia sighting thread:

Hi Jakes,

The Virginia sighting was positively identified as the MIR
space station.  MIR can be one of the brightest object in
low Earth orbit.

>I'm not an astronomers, so please forgive any faux pas...

>Friday, 30 October, 19:26 SAST (GMT-2).

>Bright, steady light moving S to N, about 70 degrees from
>horizon (20 degrees off vertical). Passed just "below" the
>"Evening Star" (Venus?). That would put it about vertical to the
>Middle East, depending on orbital range? Are there polar
>orbiting satellites?

<snip>

Cosmos 1400 reached an elevation of about 67 degrees above the
horizon as seen from Pretoria at 19:25:30 SAST.  It was moving
from S to N.  The brightest "evening star" high in the early
evening sky you saw would be the planet Jupiter (not Venus).
Cosmos 1400 was estimated to be as bright as some of the fainter
stars in the sky (about magnitude 4.1).

Cosmos 1400 is only one of many polar (or near polar) orbiting
satellites (its orbital inclination is about 81 degrees relative
to the equator).  Satellites in polar orbits will pass directly
over any point on the ground every few orbits as the Earth
rotates beneath the orbiting satellite.

Nick Balaskas