Just Looking at Data

[Tom Droege <tdroege2@earthlink.net>]

I was just looking at last night's data as it was being processed.  I came 
across a streak of dots.  About mag 11.  Visible on both the V and I images 
so it is real.  There are 21 dots on one side of the image, so I suppose 
the exposure stopped shortly after it entered the frame.  The dots are 
spaced by about 20 pixels.  Very even spacing, equally bright dots.

Seems to me this is too faint to be the flasher on an airplane.  So it was 
something very high that is blinking.  Are there any blinking satellites 
out there?  Note that it was heading in a favorable track for the 16" 
stereo view of the Mark IV to compute altitude.  If there is no stereo, 
then with enough dots we might place it at over 100000 feet.  So the stereo 
should be able to rule out an aircraft.

Image 2642641 from 030103  Heading SSE RA 4h 09m, Dec. +1d 11m

Tom Droege