[amsat-bb] Re: SpaceX / Falcon 9 Dragon sighting

[Armando Mercado]

Hi,

Could very well be solar panel covers.
At first I thought they were payload
fairings, but they were jettisoned long
before orbit was achieved.

There is also a cover for the navigation
suite/ berthing mechanism that gets
jettisoned.

Looks like SpaceTrak has the Dragon
launch catologed as objects 38348 -
38351.  No id's on anything yet.

73  Armando, N8IGJ



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Williams" <Tdub20120 at yahoo.com>
To: "Armando Mercado" <am25544 at triton.net>
Cc: <amsat-bb at amsat.org>
Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 9:08 AM
Subject: Re: [amsat-bb] SpaceX / Falcon 9 Dragon sighting


> Solar array covers?
>
> http://nasatech.net/ntF9DRAGON-COTS2-3_PAGE.html
>
> Tom
> KJ4EAW
>
> On May 22, 2012, at 2:55 AM, "Armando Mercado" <am25544 at triton.net> wrote:
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> Falcon 9/Dragon was sighted from West Michigan.
>> It (they) were about 15 mins behind the ISS.
>> There were 4 objects total, 1 object in front was
>> of steady brightness approximately 1st magitude.
>> This was the Dragon I think.
>>
>> The other three were tumbling shinning from
>> 1 to <4 magitude at about one flash per 3
>> seconds.  One object would be the booster,
>> don't know what the other 2 would be.
>>
>> Everything passed about 3 degrees north
>> of Altair at 0927UTC.
>>
>> Good luck Dragon.
>
>