[APML] Object Identification Challange

["Jay E. Potts" <jpotts@americanfocus.com>]

A friend, who is just starting to learn the basics of astrophotography, presented three
images last week at one of our Astrophoto SIG meetings. The images revealed a moving
object in the constellation Orion during the evening of Feb 26th 2005. Approx. Lat 47D-10M
N, 120D-51M W (Cle Elum, WA).

She was taking some quick piggy back shots using a 50mm lens, but was using an alt-azm
mount so exposure length was limited and field rotation is significant.

In any event, she captured an object moving roughly from the direction of the sun past the
earth at a rate of speed that suggests perhaps it was a near earth asteroid.

The link below shows a greatly cropped three frame animation with exposure lengths between
2 and 3 minutes. The object clearly is moving fast, and changing in brightness quickly.

Because resolution is poor, I've had no luck getting an imagelink in TheSky to work, and I
don't think PinPoint would have a chance at extracting decent astrometric measurements. A
quick search in TheSky does not show any minor planets in the area that are remotely this
bright. (Most are between 18-20th mag).

So, I post this to see if anyone has an idea how to determine if this is a known object, a
new object, or can suggest a way to get at least a rough astrometric measurement.

Sort'of an interesting challenge. <g>

http://www.whirlpoolgalaxy.com/temp/maxine_nagel_unknown123_labels.gif

~ Jay E. Potts
http://www.whirlpoolgalaxy.com (Astrophotography)
http://www.americanfocus.com (Landscapes & Wildlife)





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