14 replies to this topic

[carpboy]

I have recently become obsessed with satellite observations.

 

I've started using Orbitrack and have some questions.

 

I am slowly orienting myself to the sky and am becoming familiar with "my" little piece of it: The triangle formed by Vega, Altair, and Deneb, along with various "structures" in the visual proximity of each of those stars.

 

I am in SE PA and suffer from moderate light pollution.

 

I use Orbitrack to spot a satellite approaching a part of my sky, filtering to show me brightness of 5.9 or brighter. I am observing with some cheapie 8x24's, I have a 10x50 pair but not on hand, an 8x50 is coming.

 

Many satellites I just can't see. How is the Orbitrack display - is it reliable? I have on occasion spotted a satellite exactly where depicted on Orbitrack (it being close to one of the structures I have become at home with). But oftentimes, nothing. I have seen satellites with brightness 5.5 or so (binocs), but ones as bright as 3 or even a little brighter, can't find at all.

 

Then there are ones that I find that aren't on the map at all. Tonight a super bright object came across the top of the sky, easily seen with the unaided eye. Nothing on Orbitrack at all. I have it set to show me everything, filtering only on minimum brightness. This has happened several times. I saw some that were faint but the 2x28's were able to make them just barely visible, but nothing in Orbitrack.

 

So I am looking for comments about Orbitrack or perhaps a pointer to some other mapping tool.

 

Thanks.

[Stellar1]

This is interesting, good luck with the sattelite hunt, I have never even thought of specifically observing sattelites but some have taken images of the ISS using large scopes which have blown me away. Also,  would this be amateur astronomy? is there a name for sattelite observing? amateur satteliteology? pardon my ignorance.

Edited by Stellar1, 02 August 2024 - 06:06 AM.

[Barlowbill]

I have used Heavens Above for a number of years.  It is fairly accurate.  Notice, I said fairly.  Once you enter your location it pretty much tells you what you can see, at what time from your location.  It will also provide a trajectory map as you see the sky from your location.  I feel that sometimes the time is off a little.  Also, remember there are many military satellites which do not advertise.  I have seen many, many satellites which were not shown on Heavens Above.  My grandkids love to see them.  We always wave at them.

[carpboy]

This is interesting, good luck with the sattelite hunt, I have never even thought of specifically observing sattelites but some have taken images of the ISS using large scopes which have blown me away. Also,  would this be amateur astronomy? is there a name for sattelite observing? amateur satteliteology? pardon my ignorance.

 I wondered about posting in binoculars sub, that seemed to be more about hardware.

 

I dins it cool to see a man-made object several thousand km away, especially when unaided. It isn't very big yet there it is.

 

Watching the SpaceX launches got me interested. The telemetry is 1st rate, you can even see the payload(s) deploy (near) realtime.

[carpboy]

I have used Heavens Above for a number of years.

I was looking at that this morning, it is similar to in-the-sky.org, which isn't responding right now.

 

Orbitrack is nice in that you can scroll the sky in all directions, zoom, rotate, get information about each satellite, see lists of objects and even set alarms to let you know it is coming, etc. It has a fairly comprehensive listing of stellar objects in its sky map.

 

But it has issues as well and I am hoping to find someone that knows more of it than I. The devs don't respond to emails.

 

I am excited to try the 8x50's, hopefully that will bring in more of the Starlinks. I also have to become more comfortable with navigating sky maps. What looks like a straight line in the sky is of course actually curved. When I project a path of an object, the best I can do is say it is near this star moving left to right.  Being able to reliably estimate its horizon crossing position is important as it would help me confirm its identity in Orbitrack.

[ButterFly]

Heavens-above has a good app.  The website is a little difficult to use for things other than those on the list on its main page, but it's great for those things on the list.  If you're spending money on software, SkyTrack is well worth the money, but it only runs on a computer.  Previsat is also computer only and has a stepper learning curve, but it's free.

 

Satellites have to be lit up by the Sun to be visible on the ground.  When they enter Earth's shadow, they are no longer lit up.  Magnitude estimates are just that - estimates.  They can flare as a result of a happenstance alignment between you, its panels or some other highly reflective object, and the sun.  Its path across the sky is a better indicator of which satellite it is, rather than its computed estimated brightness.

 

Become more familiar with the sky and constellations.  Most satellite passes don't have a "horizon crossing position", so don't rely on that.  Earth's shadow is usually well above the horizon on the horizon opposite the sun.  "Left and right" are also rather meaningless on the sky.  Use North and East, for example.  Those don't change with the direction you happen to be looking toward.

[pattyw]

I haven't used it in quite a while, but in the past I've liked Sputnik for an iOS app. On the web, I use Heavens-Above.

[JohnTMN]

Then there are ones that I find that aren't on the map at all. Tonight a super bright object came across the top of the sky, easily seen with the unaided eye. Nothing on Orbitrack at all.

There was a "failed" deploy of "Star-link" a few weeks ago, deploy was too low. Those 40 are randomly burning up.

China and N. Korea don't tell us nothin!

If you can find us, a single global outreach and shared network that will help us all understand all of the satellites launched by every nation,,

,, Please, share the link!!

 

p.s. I was born the year the first man made satellite traversed the earth.(truth)

Pop quiz; How old am I?

Edited by JohnTMN, 03 August 2024 - 01:25 AM.

[terranceh]

Some geostationary satellites accidentally captured 2022-01-02

 

No tracking, I often do a not registered stacking/peaking of my frames. some dots popped up, and some moving around that line. Stellarium shows some moving dots are decommissioned satellites

 

[RazvanUnderStars]

I have recently become obsessed with satellite observations.

Just in case you don't already know about it, see SeeSat-L for a dedicated community of satellite observers.

[jcj380]

Then there are ones that I find that aren't on the map at all. Tonight a super bright object came across the top of the sky, easily seen with the unaided eye. Nothing on Orbitrack at all. I have it set to show me everything, filtering only on minimum brightness. This has happened several times. I saw some that were faint but the 2x28's were able to make them just barely visible, but nothing in Orbitrack.

As noted, I've also seen several bright ones that weren't listed in HA or the time was close but the track was off.

 

Enjoy your hunt!

[carpboy]

There was a "failed" deploy of "Star-link" a few weeks ago, deploy was too low. Those 40 are randomly burning up.

China and N. Korea don't tell us nothin!

If you can find us, a single global outreach and shared network that will help us all understand all of the satellites launched by every nation,,

,, Please, share the link!!

 

p.s. I was born the year the first man made satellite traversed the earth.(truth)

Pop quiz; How old am I?

I saw it again last evening, same track, not sure of the time comparison though.

 

As a lad I remember a neighbor taking me out to the beach and showing me how to use a sextant. Then a satellite passed and he pointed it out. That was at the latest late 60's.

[carpboy]

Just in case you don't already know about it, see SeeSat-L for a dedicated community of satellite observers.

LISTSERV! We're back in the 90's.

 

Thanks, I will subscribe.

[carpboy]

Last night was the first 'real' observation made with decent optics (Opticron 7x42, was supposed to be 8x50 but Amazon screwed up) and the results were spectacular.

 

The view into space was so much improved, I can't wait to see what the 50mm looks like.

 

I spotted and identified over 30 satellites, it was constant. I even had one view that had 3 sats crossing my field of view at one time.

 

Bonus was a really bright meteor.

[zizzapnia]

I used to do a lot of satellite observing. The SeeSat-L mailing list was a great resource, and I was surprised to find it's still operating:

 

http://www.mailman.satobs.org/seesat/