This is a bright, wide-path event and has a good crop of observers; 9 as of a day before. The path covers Santa Cruz. It has the same slope as an even brighter event by Troja, 45 minutes later. There will be very little time to move, and I'd suggest not trying to move. I will be trying both events from Cabrillo Observatory, where both events should be above the local horizon. Mobile observers (Kirk?) can work around that chord. Karl is OK at home for these, but not good for Troja. But since this Troja event is so very bright, it will be an excellent candidate for searching for even small tiny moons.
The duration of both of these events is the same: 2.4s. I know that looks like a sloppy slip on my making of the charts, but indeed, both events max duration is 2.4s. Both Czechoslovakia and Troja are excellent candidates for moon hunting.
Alt=35, Az=67 in Auriga inside the "Pentagon".
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I observed from the parking lot by the weather station at Cabrillo College. At 2x, some wind trouble so I had to use the "batman maneuver" to try to shield the scope somewhat, during the event. I had the recording going, with wind trouble, until I could get into position, and stayed there for about 1 minute after the event before moving away. I do see my "batman" did help. If I try to reduce data from the start, wind gusts cause tracking to fail. I trimmed to avoid the windy times, and have less than 1 minute before the event that was good for tracking. I also had to raise the aperture mask size to 31 px from the usual 21 px that I typically use, and I also had to raise the static circular mask size to 3.2px from the usually better S/N value of 2.4px I usually default to. I had to face away from the computer so I do not know if I had a positive. I recorded from 6:02:00 to 6:06:00pm. Star looked good and stable above background when wind was minimal.
Long:121 55 37.41
Lat 36 59 26.18
Elev 74m
Trimmed start/end
Start: 2:03:01 UT
End: 2:04:21 UT
It looks like there may have been a wind gust that got past my coat just a few seconds before the event, but the event period itself looks good.
NIE Sigma=48.6
MagDrop report: percentDrop: 94.9 magDrop: 3.239 +/- 0.434 (0.95 ci)
DNR: 2.29
D time: [02:03:52.7952]
D: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0101} seconds
D: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0302} seconds
D: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0740} seconds
R time: [02:03:54.3420]
R: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0101} seconds
R: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0302} seconds
R: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0740} seconds
Duration (R - D): 1.5468 seconds
Duration: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0148} seconds
Duration: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0361} seconds
Duration: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0851} seconds
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I got a 1.4848 sec. positive for Czechloslovakia, Dec. 30, 1x at Moran lake.
NIE sigma 44.3
magDrop report: percentDrop: 95.2 magDrop: 3.306 +/- 0.775 (0.95 ci)
DNR: 2.40
D time: [02:03:53.1447]
D: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0054} seconds
D: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0174} seconds
D: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0574} seconds
R time: [02:03:54.6295]
R: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0054} seconds
R: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0174} seconds
R: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0574} seconds
Duration (R - D): 1.4848 seconds
Duration: 0.6800 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0087} seconds
Duration: 0.9500 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0241} seconds
Duration: 0.9973 containment intervals: {+/- 0.0658} seconds
RN: Kirk's timing errors are better than RN's, given it's at 1x vs the 2x that I (RN) used. I did not want to risk using 1x if wind shake and tracking loss would be the result during analysis.
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NIE test, even with the smaller sample of trimmed time, gives an NIE sigma of 48.6. The 2x data is brighter and quieter, than the 1x data of Kirk's, although Kirk's data still looks excellent and does not suffer from wind induced tracking and seeing. |
Tried from home, but event ended up behind a tree. No data.
