It looks like Mars took one for the team in December 2021. There was a Mars quake & they just found the crater from the impact.

NASA confirms massive meteoroid behind huge Mars crater, earthquake - UPI.com

Better now than when we colonize it. 

Phil S.

CNEOS presicts that the large NEO (217628) Lugh 1990 HA will make a close approach on 2022-Nov-20 09:13 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.13484 AU. H=16.6 magnitude, V Relative=21.16 km/sec, 'Rarity'=1 & Condition Code=0. This NEO has a diameter of 1.4 km.

Using recent orbital elements from the MPC, ST4v predicts that this object will reach a peak brightness of 14.7 magnitude on November 15 at 0.15 AU distance when it will be moving through Monoceros at 10.8"/min. At close approach it will be moving through Hydra at 12.8"/min & 15.8 magnitude. It looks like it will be within ~2° of Bellatrix in Orion on the morning on November 2.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from October 19 to November 27 as seen from Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2552]

This large, bright NEO should be visible from the northern & southern hemispheres, plus there's plenty of warning. 

Good hunting,

Phil S.

Newbie Alert!  I have a question about the "Ideal Eyepiece" column on the nightly planner screen.  I have profiled my telescope in the software with several lenses (30mm. 20mm, 12.5mm, 10mm and 8mm).  When I load a filter class (i.e. Planetary Nebula) the resulting list contains 2 nebulae that are best viewed with my 10mm eyepiece but also lists 16 nebulae ideally viewed with my 20mm plus a 2x barlow. 

Can someone explain why the software seems to prefer a barlow'ed 20 to a straight 10mm.  Wouldn't these provide equal magnification?

If it matters, both eyepieces are from the same series and have the same field of view.

Thanks!

CNEOS predicts that this large NEO will make a close approach on 2022-Nov-21 17:11 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.14137 AU. H=15.8 magnitude, V relative=21.36 km/sec, 'Rarity'=2 & Condition Code=0. This is a large object, 3.484±0.789 km so it's already 15.5 magnitude according to ST4v despite still being 0.4 AU distant. I thought that it might be interesting to keep an eye on it as it approaches.

Using MPC's orbital elements for the epoch October 23 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a maximum brightness of 14.1 magnitude from November 13-18 traveling from Lynx into Ursa Major at ~10"/min. The light curve is quite flat since the MP is large & 0.14-0.15 AU distant at that time.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path of this NEO from 2022 October 19-November24 for Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2551]

Good hunting,

Phil S.

CNEOS predicts that the recently discovered NEO 2022 RM4 will make a close approach on 2022-Nov-01 18:28 ± 00:04 UT at a distance of 0.01536 AU. H=19.5 magnitude, V Relative=23.47 km/sec, 'Rarity'=2, Condition Code=6. This is a large one. It was discovered by Pan-STARRS-2, Haleakala on 2022-9-12. The orbit has been repeatedly refined since discovery as the information in the ST4v Object Information dialog shows. The uncertainty of the time of close approach has been reduced from almost 3 days to 4 minutes with the additional observations.

Using the orbital elements from the MPC for epoch 2022 Oct 21 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this NEO will reach a peak brightness of 14.4 magnitude on 2022 Nov 1 1400 EDT at a distance of 0.02 AU when it will be moving through Sagittarius at 126.8"/min in daylight as seen from Columbus, Ohio. It's predicted to brighten from 16 magnitude on Oct 29 to 14.7 magnitude on Oct 31, The improved elements have resulted in a reduced predicted peak brightness, unfortunately. I left the predictions from the old Sep 16 elements in the OI for comparison, so be sure to use the ones for Oct 21. I don't expect newer elements to change the predictions much at this point, but if they do, I'll update this post accordingly.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path from October 29 - November 1 as seen from Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2547]

The moon will interfere, unfortunately. As always, parallax will affect the position of the NEO, so make charts for your observing location if you plan to make observations of this object.

Dennis, I didn't calculate an ephemeris for your location, but the close approach time looks good for you. Hope the weather cooperates.

Good hunting all,

Phil S.

Hi Greg,

I successfully connected to all 3 of the iTelescopes in Chile today. Perhaps they've improved the internet connection. Since ST4i doesn't have the information about the T71 & T72 scopes, I downloaded the Telescope Info from their support page.

Here's a link for T71:

https://support.itelescope.net/support/s...lescope-71

The narrowband filter bandwidths are 5 nm.

Here's the link for T72: 

https://support.itelescope.net/support/s...les/254436

No bandwidth given for the narrowband filters here, unfortunately.

Both of these scopes look like real beauties, but T72 is on the pricy side.

Hope this helps,

Phil S.

CNEOS reports that the newly discovered NEO 2022 UG2 will make a close approach on 2022-Oct-21 09:32 ± < 00:01 UT at a distance of 0.00415 AU. H=26.9 magnitude, V relative=10.53 km/sec, 'Rarity'=0 & Condition Code=6. This object was discovered on October 18 by PanSTARRS 2 on Haleakala. This NEO is slightly smaller & will pass farther away than 2022 UC1, so it is predicted to be fainter.

Using MPC's elements for 2022 October 20 00:00 UT ST4v predicts that this object will reach peak brightness of 16.0 magnitude on October 21 0000 EDT at a distance of 656.4k km when it will be passing through Triangulum at 193.1"/min. Predicted minimum distance (to the nearest hour) of 623.2k km occurs at 0500 EDT October 21 when it will be 16.4 magnitude passing through Andromeda at 207.7"/min.

Here is an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted path as seen from Columbus, Ohio: [attachment=2546]

Since this NEO will pass very close to earth, parallax will affect the predicted positions of this object. Anyone who wants to observe this object will need to download the orbital elements from MPC & generate their own charts.

The big time MP hunters have been very busy lately. This is one of 37 new NEOs added to the MPC's list of NEOs today. There were >25 yesterday, too.

Good hunting,

Phil S.

CNEOS predicts that the newly discovered NEO 2022 UC1 will make a close approach on 2022-Oct-21 22:46 ± 00:02 UT at a distance of 0.00364 AU. H=26.3 magnitude, V relative=6.77 km/sec, 'Rarity' = 1, Condition Code = 7.  This MP was discovered on October 17 at Pan-STARRS 2 on Haleakala.

Using MPC's elements for October 19, 2022 00:00 UT, ST4v predicts that this MP will reach a peak brightness of 14.8 magnitude on October 21 at 2100 EDT when the NEO will be moving through Aries at 147.4"/min at 553.9k km distance. Close approach (to the nearest hour) is predicted to occur on October 21 at 1900 EDT (2300 UT) when 2022 UC1 will be moving through Pisces at 151.1"/min, 551.2k km distant in twilight as seen from Columbus, Ohio. Unfortunately ST4v predicts that it will not be observable with a 13" telescope under those conditions, but 2000 EDT is possible.

Here's an Interactive Atlas chart showing the predicted position of 2022 UC1 on October 21-22 as seen from Columbus, Ohio. Since this NEO will get very close, parallax will affect the predicted positions, so you'll need to make charts for your location to get accurate positions for this object. At least we got some warning for this one.

Good hunting.

Phil S.

Earth was just buzzed by the 2 newly discovered NEOs 2022 TQ2 on 2022 Oct 13 and 2022 TM2 on 2022-Oct-15 09:18 ± < 00:01 UT. 2022 TQ2 was discovered on Oct 14 after it's close approach while 2022 TM2 was discovered on Oct 13, but I didn't add it to ST4v's NEAs at Today's Epoch data file until this morning. It wasn't in yesterday's download.

Here's the Object Information data for 2022 TQ2: [attachment=2543]

Here's the Object Information data for 2022 TM2: [attachment=2544]
This was a 'Rarity'=2 close approach.

2022 TM2 was predicted to become quite bright. Too bad there wasn't sufficient warning to observe it.

Phil S.

CNEOS predicts that this Aten class NEO will make another close approach on 2022-Nov-01 02:30 ± 00:04 UT at Re of 0.01515 AU (2266.8k km). H=29.6 magnitude, Vrel=5.25 km/sec, 'Rarity'=0.

ST4v predicts that this NEO will only reach a peak brighnness of 22.7 magnitude on 2022 Nov 4. The light curve is fairly flat so it should retain this brightness for several days - not that it matters much. The interesting thing about this object is that it was discovered last year AFTER it passed within 0.00020 AU (29.3k km) on 2021-Nov-01 10:33 ± < 00:01 UT. It was discovered on November 2. The Earth MOID (Minimum Orbit Intersection Distance) is 0.000141093 AU! 

Here's the Object Information for this NEO: [attachment=2542]

It's not really observable, but I thought that it's neat that this new object has come around for another close pass a year later.

Phil S.