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Old 21-08-2009, 10:47 PM
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Inmykombi (Geoff)
They aint just doubles :o

Inmykombi is offline
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Gosford NSW Australia
Posts: 2,339
I too some years ago found something that was similar to your target.

I watched the object for about 2.5 hrs. It hardly moved in the sky, and I only had to adjust the EQ Mount every 10 mins or so to keep it in the field of view.

I called the Sydney observatory to confirm what I was seeing and got an answering machine.
I then called a member of the NSW Astronomical Society who confirmed that the object was "flashing" but the person I spoke to was seeing the flash at a different point in time than me from a different location. This meant that the object was tumbling and the reflected light was reaching the different location at a different time to me.

I then called Koolang Observatory near Buckety, who confirmed my observation, and continued to plot the course over a few hours.

It turned out that the object I was observing was a Japanese Satellite that was suuposed to go into a Geo-stationary orbit which but had a major positioning rocket failure.
The satellite then went into an orbit between what I can remember being between 4 thousand and 18 thousand kilometers ( egg shaped orbit ).
Its name I still remember as KIKU 6.

Its now run out of power and is nothing more than space junk.

It is tumbling in orbit and reflects light back to Earth at regular intervals.
Due to its high altitude, it can be seen long after the sun has set.

Maybe thats what it is, but if not, maybe something similar.

geoffro.
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