CNEOS predicts that this NEO will make a close approach on 2023-Jan-09 13:59 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.07254 AU. H=19.6 magnitude, V relative=9.00 km/sec, 'Rarity'=1 & Condition Code=0. This is a medium-sized object, 0.482±0.007 km.

Using MPC's orbital elements for the epoch 2022 December 20 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a maximum brightness of 15.7 magnitude on January 2, 0.08 AU distant traveling through Lynx at ~8"/min. Close approach occurs on 2023 January 9 1100 EST (to the nearest hour) when ST4v predicts that it's 16.1 magnitude moving through Camelopardalis at 10.1"/min, but in daylight for Columbus, Ohio. This NEO will be visible for several days around maximum brightness. Using the elements for 2022 Dec 28 0000 UT the predicted maximum brightness is 16.76 magnitude still occurring on the morning of January 2.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from 2022 December 27-2023 January 7 for Columbus, Ohio:     

Good hunting,

Phil S.

Hello,

Phil has found a bug in the minor planet code with regard to the download of the MPC Daily NEA orbital elements. The problem was that a feature I had implemented last year was accidentally disabled in testing. Nobody noticed until the MPC updated to the new standard epoch for next February. When that happened, if (and only if) you had NEA elements downloaded from one of the standard downloads, a set of elements with an epoch in the future was created, and the MPC Daily NEA orbital elements would fail to overwrite it. As a result, the orbital elements for the day were not added to the database.

I have released an update to version 4.0j R21 that fixes this issue. The MPC NEA Daily orbital elements will now overwrite the elements from the fture epoch. I apologize for any trouble this may have caused.

Please note that I don't always have time to follow the posts on this subforum. I only stop in from time to time to see what's going on with a particularly interesting flyby. So if you run into similar problems in the future, please bring them to my attention. If there is something that does not work as well as you think it should work, it is best to describe the problem (rather than propose a solution) with screenshots as appropriate. I will look into it a devise a fix or a solution. Please don't assume I know about the problem or that it can't be fixed!

CNEOS predicts that this NEO will make a close approach on 2022-Dec-20 12:35 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.01717 AU. H=21.1 magnitude, V relative=11.58 km/sec, 'Rarity'=2 & Condition Code=0. This is a medium-sized object, 160 - 360 m.

Using MPC's orbital elements for the epoch 2022 August 9 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a maximum brightness of 14.7 magnitude on December 19, 0.02 AU distant traveling through Pyxis at ~45"/min. It may be brighter than 15.5 magnitude from December 15 - 20.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from 2022 December 16-20 for Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2598]
Note that the IA chart is using elements  for 2022 Nov 3.

Good hunting,

Phil S.

CNEOS predicts that this NEO will make a close approach on 2022-Dec-15 08:12 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.00459AU. H=23.1 magnitude, V relative=5.91 km/sec, 'Rarity'=2 & Condition Code=0. This is a medium-sized object, 63 - 140 m.

Using MPC's orbital elements for the epoch 2022 December 13 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a maximum brightness of 13.4 magnitude on December 16, 822k km distant traveling through Lepus at ~70"/min. Close approach occurs on December 15 0300 EST (to the nearest hour) when ST4v predicts that it's 13.7 magnitude moving through Fornax at 104"/min, but below the horizon from Columbus, Ohio.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from 2022 December 14-24 for Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2597]

Since this object will pass very close to earth, parallax will affect the predicted positions of this NEO as it passes. Anyone interested in observing it should download the MPC's NEAs at Today's Epoch datafile using SkyTools' MP download options & create charts for their location.

Good hunting,

Phil S.

Hello,

We had a big slowdown for these forums in the last few days. I traced the problem to a plugin that we weren't actually using, and disabling it sped things up a lot. Unfortunately, this also somehow caused completely unrelated problems, such as some pages or features not loading properly. I think I have everything fixed, but if you have any problems, please let me know here or via email to support at skyhound dot com.

This NEO impacted earth on 2022 Nov 19 08:27 UT in Southern Ontario, Canada. It was detected only 3 hours before impact & would have missed but for earth's gravitational pull.

Here's the Wikipedia article:

2022 WJ1 - Wikipedia

Pretty cool,

Phil S.

Hello.
I am new here and I am considering buying SkyTools, but am somewhat confused of which version to get.
I have a rather unusual workflow, I’ll try to explain it here.

I do EAA. So my workflow is kind of a hybrid between visual and imaging I would say.
I have an eVscope by Unistellar, which I control with an app on the tablet. I can slew to an object in the app’s database or enter coordinates manually. When I am on the object I do “live stacking” and observe. Sometimes I take a picture of what I am seeing. I log my observations in sky safari app.  
I do this all from my highly light polluted backyard. I live in an apartment building on the ground flor, and I have an atrium which is surrounded by other buildings, so there is much obstruction. 
My biggest challenge is finding out when is what up, based on the obstructions and my solution to that was to create a custom horizon file (another app called observer.pro), which exports an overlay image to sky safari so I can see if an object I am trying to observe is obstructed or not. But that is very limiting as you can imagine. 
I watched the youtube video on using the real time observing tool and that pretty much covers my needs.

What do I need/expect:

• Plan my session in advanced based on my location and my custom horizon
  
• When planing I would like to filter by size,  by altitude in given observation interval, by brightness, and if I already observed it.
  
• I should be able to see only those objects that are visible from my location in the specified observing interval based on my custom horizon
  
• The plan should include a common name for an object in the results and J2000 coordinates which I need for input for the slew.
  
• When observing I want to know which object in the plan is best to observe right now, i want to mark it as observed for this session and as observed globally (so I can filter out unobserved when preparing another plan)
  

• Slew control (I’ll do that manually, with the app, thank you very much)
  
• What eyepiece to use
  
• To know when is the best time to photograph an object
  
• Anything filtering out based on the weather, event if there is a light fog, or some clouds, through live stacking I can still observe the object, so I really don’t need objects filtered out based on weather or seeing conditions or similar not in planning phase nor in real time observing phase
  

Did you feel the breeze?

The CNEOS website indicates that the newly discovered NEO 2022 WM7 made a close approach on 2022-Nov-28 02:24 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.204 LD (78.55k km, 0.00053 AU). H=29.9 magnitude, V relative=11.58 km/sec, 'Rarity' = 0, Condition Code = 6.  This MP was discovered at Pan-STARRS 1, Haleakala on 2022-11-26.

Using MPC's elements for November 28, 2022 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this MP reached a peak brightness of 16.9 magnitude on November 27 at 1930 EST when the NEO was moving through Aquarius at 17"/sec at 1098.5k km distance. Close approach (to the nearest 10 minutes) was predicted to occur on November 27 at 2120 EST (0220 UT) when 2022 WM7 at 18.3 magnitude was moving through Sagittarius at 29.3"/sec, 79.52k km distant, but below the horizon as seen from Columbus, Ohio.  By 2022 Nov 28 11:00 EST it had already faded to 22.6 magnitude & slowed to 43"/min. ST4v predicted that it was not observable with a 13" telescope even at its best.

This was a small one, estimated to be 1-6 meters.

Phil S.

Hi,

I have added my cam manually but when i select my cam i get 0 objects meet visibility camera.
Criteria are set to: sun, moon, planets, any quality, above and below horizon, detectable.
I only get object if i set the criteria to Any SNR.
When i select another camera from the list i get a lot of visible objects.
Maybe it has something to do with the Quantum efficiency settings ?
How do i get the Quantum efficiency settings for this camera?

Thanks,

Robert

CNEOS predicts that this large NEO will make a close approach on 2022-Dec-02 10:07 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.03155AU. H=19.6 magnitude, V relative=28.84 km/sec, 'Rarity'=2 & Condition Code=0. This is a large object, 310 - 700 m, but it's only 18 magnitude according to ST4v while still being 0.2 AU distant.

Using MPC's orbital elements for the epoch 2022 November 17 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a maximum brightness of 16.5 magnitude on November 30 traveling from Hydrus into Octans at ~38"/min. It will pass through the LMC on November 29 in daylight for Australian observers. This is a southern hemisphere object that ST4v predicts would not be visible in a 13" telescope. The moon will interfere. The iTelescope site in Chile might offer a good view.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from 2022 November 29-December 2 for Brisbane, Australia: [attachment=2582]

Good hunting,

Phil S.

Edit: Yes, the iTelescope Chile site is perfectly located to observe the transit(?) of 2009 HV58 across the LMC on the evening of 2022 Nov 28.