Recent Asteroidal Occ'n Observations - updated 2004 January 19
Besides the recent additons listed below, farther down the list you will find analyses with sky-plane plots and solutions for the occultations by 1366 Piccolo on 2003 April 28 and by 275 Sapientia on 2003 February 8; also note new results for 1354 Botha on Oct. 9. Also, I think we now have all of the observations of the July 18th 1263 Varsavia occultation, but a few discrepancies remain among the video observations that should be resolved - see the item for Varsavia that was updated Dec. 9th below. Since then, a couple of the discrepancies have been resolved by obtaining good time insertions of the tapes involved.
Binary asteroid 1089 Tama appulse in NC and GA - new 2004 Jan. 19
The appulse of an 11.9-mag. star in Gemini by (1089) Tama was video recorded from sites in North Carolina and Georgia, with at least one positive observation. More information is here.
Last asteroidal occultation of 2003 timed in Texas - new 2004 Jan. 19
The occultation of 9.0-mag. SAO 98314 by (208) Lacrimosa was timed from 5 stations in Texas, including a video recording by 15-year-old Beth Turner at The Woodlands, perhaps the youngest observer of an asteroidal occultation (and almost certainly the youngest to video record one). Richard Nugent's Web site has a plot and more information.
111th asteroidal occultation of 2003 timed in Europe - updated 2004 Jan. 19
The occultation of 6.2-mag. SAO 40029 by (925) Alphonsina has been observed from at least 20 stations in Poland, Germany, France, and Spain. The path shifted south and cloudy skies (and, for some, heavy snow) thrawted others, so this will not be nearly as well-observed as the August 26th Bertholda event, but I think it is still the 4th- best-observed event of 2003. A few observers near the northern limit saw the star occulted twice, so Alphonsina seems to be another peanut-shaped asteroid. Maps, plots, and details can be found at Eric Frappa's Euraster Web site.
Interesting video of Portlandia event from Toronto - new 2003 Dec. 23
An occultation of 8.2-mag. ZC 3 was recorded with the 1.8m telescope at the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory north of Toronto on Dec. 7. The star disappeared briefly before the main occultation, indicating an unusual knob or satellite of Portlandia - the video can be seen here. The occultation was timed from at least 6 other locations in Ontario and was also video recorded at Medina, Ohio.
Please Verify My List of All Observed Asteroidal Occultations - updated 2003 Dec. 23
A summary list of all known asteroidal occultations that have been observed can be found here, with a short version including only observations made in 2002 and 2003 is here. I am starting to write an article for Sky and Telescope on the 2002 and 2003 observations, so I would appreciate it if you could view the list for the 84 known (to me) events observed in 2002, as well as the ones observed this year, and let me know about anything that I may have missed, or any corrections that I should make.
103rd asteroidal occultation of 2003 timed in Japan - updated 2003 Dec. 23
An occultation of 10.6-mag. TYC 5556-00437-1 was video recorded from Kagoshima, Japan on December 2nd, the 102nd observed asteroidal occultation of 2003. The duration was 3.6 seconds.
Nov. 24th 7th-mag. 707 Steina occultation in Virginia - updated 2003 Dec. 3
The occultation by this small asteroid was video recorded from locations near Bowling Green and Woodstock, and timed visually near near Massaponax, showing that the path shifted about 1.2 path-widths north of its predicted path; click here for details, including a plot of the observations and a fitted 13.5-km circle.
Nov. 19th 7th-mag. 897 Lysistrata occultation in w. USA - new 2003 Dec. 2
The occultation by this small asteroid was video recorded by Bob Sandy from Blue Springs, Missouri (only a short blink near the southern limit); Rob Robinson at Bonner Springs, Kansas; and Jim Stoffaire near Kramer Junction, California, showing that Steve Preston's path prediction was accurate to within a few km; more information will be provided soon.
Nov. 7th 6th-mag. 1312 Vassar occultation in Japan - new 2003 Nov. 10
The occultation by this small asteroid was video recorded from two locations in Japan; see a plot and read more here.
Nov. 6th 106 Dione occultation in Washington State - updated 2003 Dec. 2
Steve Preston video recorded the occultation by 106 Dione from North Bend, WA; read his account here. He reports that another observer, in British Columbia, saw an approximately 6-second occultation.
Nov. 5th 72 Feronia occultation in w. Maryland - new 2003 Nov. 10
Racing clouds moving in from the east, I video recorded the occultation of an 8.4-mag. star by 72 Feronia from Sidling Mountain, Maryland; details are here.
Nov. 4th 1191 Alfaterna misses in Virginia - new 2003 Nov. 10
The northern part of the Alfaterna path was covered by one remote and two attended telescopes in s.e. Virginia, but apparently the path shifted south; details are here.
Oct. 24th 978 Aidamina occultation in U.S.A. - updated 2003 Oct. 29
The occultation of 8.3-mag. SAO 126952 by 978 Aidamina was timed from 5 stations in the U.S.A., from Washington, New Mexico, and Texas, on October 24. The ellipse fitted to the observations is 88 km by 64 km; the plot and details can be found here.
375 Ursula occultation observed in Japan - updated 2003 Nov. 11
The occultation of 9.6-mag. SAO 189284 by the large C-class asteroid 375 Ursula was timed from 15 stations in Japan on October 19. An occultation by Ursula observed in 1982 in the western USA showed that the asteroid was a little more than 200 km in diameter, much larger than expected (even current tables incorrectly give the diameter as 106 km). See the sky-plane plot and some other information here, including details of previous occultations by Ursula in 1982 and in 1999 (the analysis of the 1999 observations is new with an attempt to take into account the star's close duplicity).
(85) Io occultation recorded in Calgary & probably Baltimore - new 2003 Oct. 16
The Oct. 14th occultation by (85) Io was video recorded by Andrew Lowe from his home in Calgary, Alberta; his 10-second event indicated that the path shifted south so that it must have passed over all of Maryland and the DC area. But clouds from an approaching front made observation difficult in the area. In spite of that, Alin Tolea obtained a video recording from Bloomberg Observatory in Baltimore; analysis of that recording will probably be able to locate the 0.4-mag. drop that occurred during that occultation.
Clouds spoiled most attempts for the 7th-mag. Union occ'n - new 2003 Oct. 16
Deteriorating weather forecasts caused us to abort our plans to travel from Maryland to observe the Union occultation on Oct. 13. No observations of that event were obtained, but weather observations indicated that in fact it was clear over the path across southern Arizona, westernmost Texas, and eastern Louisiana (no occultation was reported at New Orleans, a little south of the updated path). Click here for prediction information.
1354 Botha occultation observed in Belgium - updated 2003 Nov. 11
The occultation of 9.0-mag. SAO 109453 by the 53-km (expected) asteroid 1354 Botha was video recorded at the Astrolab-IRIS II Observatory near Ieper, Belgium. Miss observations from Bruges, Belgium and Swainsboro, Georgia constrain Botha's shape both north and south of the Ieper chord, as shown here, showing that the actual path passed about halfway between the predictions of Jan Manek and Steve Preston.
Good 420 Bertholda occultation observed in Europe - updated 2003 Oct. 28
The occultation of 8.6-mag. SAO 144929 by the 146-km P-class asteroid 420 Bertholda was recorded by observers at over 70 separate stations in Poland, Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland, France, and Portugal to make it the 2nd most successfully-observed asteroidal occultation to date, replacing last September's Tercidina event from that position. All of the observations, maps and reduction profiles can be found on Eric Frappa's Web site.
Varsavia Becomes Best-Observed Small Asteroid Occultation, July 18 - updated 2003 December 2
The occultation of 6.4-mag. SAO 100819 near Arcturus by the 49-km asteroid (1263) Varsavia was timed by 41 observers from British Columbia to Southern California; read more here, including an updated plot of the observations and a 55 km x 36 km fitted ellipse. It is now the 4th-best-observed asteroidal occultation. Recently (December 2), our data were updated with improved times determined from the British Columbian tapes provided by Frank Anet and from other observers, but a few discrepancies among the video observations remain that should be resolved.
June 24th Eclipse of Naked-Eye Star by Asteroid - updated 2003 July 8
The asteroid (124) Alkeste covered beta Virginis (Zavijava) for observers in an 83-km-wide band crossing southern Australia and South Island, New Zealand on Tuesday evening, June 24. Nine observers in each country timed the occultation. A plot of the available observations, preliminary accounts, and the information prepared before the event to help any naked-eye observer find the star and time the occultation are here.
Occultations observed June 18th and June 26th - new June 30
Paul Maley video recorded the occultation of an 11.3-mag. star by the asteroid (85) Io [NOT the Galilean satellite!] on June 18th from his home in Clear Lake, a south Houston, TX suburb. Steve Preston video recorded the occultation of 9.4-mag. SAO 161454 by (976) Benjamina near Ukiah, Oregon on June 26th. So far, no other observations of these events are known.
June 8th Double Hitter in Calif. & Nevada - new June 13
Jim Stoffaire became the 3rd person to time two asteroidal occultations in one night, near Tonopah, Nevada. Four others also timed the occultation by 179 Klytaemnestra from the mountains of southern California. For more, click here.
May 26th Hercynia Occultation Observed - new May 27
In spite of cirrus and Denver lights, Rich Keen timed a 3.5-second occultation from his mountain location southwest of Boulder, Colorado. Observers under mostly clear skies in Kansas and Missouri were less fortunate. For more, click here.
Eclipse Occultations by Galatea & Nealley - new, 2003 May 19
The May 16th (74) Galatea occultation was observed from widely- separated chords in Georgia by Roger Venable and Jeff Lackmeyer, each with about 5-second occultations; widespread clouds prevented observation farther west. Jim McGaha at Grasslands Obs. in Sonoita, Arizona and Don Davies in Torrance, Calif. both timed a short occultation (2 sec. or less) from locations near the actual northern limit of the (903) Nealley occultation that also occurred during the partial phases of the eclipse, but after totality. Derald Nye at Corona de Tucson, Ariz., video taped a miss. The observations of both of these occultations essentially confirmed Steve Preston's prediction, showing an actual accuracy of less than the expected 1-sigma error. Click here for prediction information about the good occultation of 9.5-mag. SAO 98128 near Jupiter by the 118-km asteroid (74) Galatea. Nye and McGaha also video taped an occultation by (68) Leto at their observatories on May 5th.
April 28th 287 Nephthys Occultation in Europe - updated April 29
This was an occultation of a 9.1-mag. star by a sizeable asteroid that probably has a satellite. Information about this interesting event, which unfortunately was clouded out in most places, including an extensive list of stations sorted by distance from Jan Manek's updated central line, is here. Fraincois Colas travelled 1200 km from Paris to find clear skies at Mont Saxonnex - Cluses in the Chamonix Valley only a few km from J. Manek's predicted central line and had no occultation. Only two other observations, both negative, were far from the path, in northern England and near Naples, Italy; others were all clouded out, as reported so far.
April 28th 1366 Piccolo Occultation, Del./Maryland to Oregon - updated Nov. 10
This was an occultation of a 9.4-mag. star less than a degree from 3rd-mag. eta Virginis that occurred right over central Maryland, and other areas on an almost east-west path across the USA. For more information, click here.
Marth 29th Chiron Appulse Observations - updated 2003 April 3
On 2003 March 29, three observers in Japan timed the occultation of 10.3-mag. TYC 2389-01540-1 by (109) Felicitas, but they had more luck than observers in the western USA, several of whom reported no dimmings of the 11th-mag. target star. More about the (2060) Chiron appulse is here. However, recently Walter Morgan, the observer deepest into the Chiron occultation predicted path, believes his tape shows one or two gradual but complete (or nearly so) occultations of the star at the expected time; more analysis will be needed to be sure.
6.7-mag. occultation in Hawaii & Japan, Mar. 22/23 - updated 2003 July 8
Near midnight HST (10h U.T. March 23 UT) Saturday night, the best asteroidal occultation of the year in the USA, by the large, dark outer-belt asteroid (704) Interamnia, was observed in Hawaii, and also part of Japan. IOTA members travelled to Maui and to the Big Island to work with local observers to record the event. More about it is here, including plots and data from both Hawaii and Japan, and information about past observed occultations by Interamnia, especially plots and details of the well-observed occultation of 1996 December 17 in the southwestern USA.
New Web Sites give Details of European Asteroidal Occultation Observations - Updated 2003 April 1
Eric Frappa in France has set up a Web site giving details of recently-observed asteroidal occultations in Europe in a format similar to that used by Jan Manek on the Czech Web site. Information about the March 17th (117) Lomia event is there, including timings from at least 3 stations in France. Observers in Ontario and Michigan were clouded out for that event. In addition, EAON Information Bulletin 38, covering European observations from 2002 March to August, is available in PDF format here.
663 Gerlinde Occultation timed in Maryland & W.Va. - new 2003 March 17
The path for the Gerlinde occultation shifted south at least half a path-width so that the s. limit was near Washington, DC; read about the observations here. Several observers failed to find the star due to bright moonlight so it looks like we will not have a good spread of timings across the width of the path (and across the asteroid to define its shape). The last station information is here with more prediction details here.
Mar. 8th Backlunda event recorded in s. VA, NC, & TX - updated 2003 March 13
Some information about last weekend's Backlunda and Suevia events are in the expedition item (see the asteroidal occultation part of it) here. Station and other prediction information for the Backlunda event are here. Richard Nugent has fitted an ellipse to the 4 observations and also gives profiles and news of other asteroidal occultations observed in Texas here.
March 1st Atalante Occultation timed in Santa Rosa, CA - new 2003 March 3
Unfortunately, it was cloudy apparently everywhere within the path from the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean. George Loyer timed the occultation at Santa Rosa, California, and two miss observations north and south of him narrowly constrain the path; read more here. Prediction information is given here.
Arsinoe Occultation Recorded in San Francisco Bay area - Updated Feb. 25
The 2003 Feb. 21st occultation of an 11th-mag. star by the asteroid (404) Arsinoe was timed from at least five stations in the San Francisco Bay area, including video observations of short events near both limits. Some observers in southern California tried to observe from their homes in the Los Angeles region, but were too far south and had no occultation; the actual path crossed the Mojave Desert, close to Steve Preston's last prediction, according to the northern Calif. observations. Read more about this event, and see two video clips of it, here.
February 8th 275 Sapientia occultation timed from 2 NC Sites - New 2003 Nov. 10
Roger Venable and Dennis Rowley travelled to North Carolina to time the occultation of a 10th-mag. star by (275) Sapientia; see a plot and some more information here.
Virginia video resolved close binary during the Jan. 22nd Arethusa occultation - Updated Jan. 23
Another occultation, of an 11.6-mag. star, by (95) Arethusa was videorecorded by David Dunham and Wayne Warren from Cold Harbor, Virginia, 19 km north of Steve Preston's northern limit (clouds and time prevented observation farther south), showing that the actual path was far north of the predicted one. The video tape shows a possible 0.5-second step disappearance, showing that the star may be a close binary. Read more here.
Jan. 15th Arethusa Occultation Timed in FL and TX - Updated Jan. 22
An occultation of a 10.9-mag. star by the relatively large (expected diameter 136 km) asteroid (95) Arethusa was timed visually by Paul Maley and Richard Nugent in southern Texas, and by Chris Stephan in Sebring, Florida on Jan. 15 UT, showing that Steve Preston's prediction for that event was rather accurate. Read more about the first results here.
Bathilde Path moved farther south - Updated Feb. 21
The good occultation of 7.7-mag. SAO 117679 by (441) Bathilde on Friday night, Jan. 10/11 crossed southern Europe and the southeastern USA. It was observed from stations in Georgia, Texas, northern Spain, and possibly Louisiana. The actual path was more than a path-width south of the prediction updates, apparently due to a relatively poor current position for this relatively bright star. Read more about the first results here and about two remote videos set up for the occultation, and the Maryland expedition results, here.
Three Asteroidal Occultations on Jan. 1 & 2 - updated 2003 Jan. 7
Remarkably, Richard Nugent observed three asteroidal occultations during the first two nights of 2003, the first time that anyone has achieved "3 in 2", as far as I know. Details of his observations can be found here, along with brief accounts of 4 other asteroidal occultations observed from 2002 Dec. 24 to 2003 Jan. 3 - already in 2003, 4 events have been observed!
8th-mag. Asteroidal Occultation Dec. 24 - updated 2002 Feb. 21
The occultation of 8.4-mag. SAO 97327 by the C-class asteroid (334) Chicago, was timed from 9 stations from southeastern Pennsylvania to Alberta. The path was about 0.4 path-widths south of Steve Preston's last prediction, so that it passed over almost all of Maryland and the DC area, but it was clear in the Mid-Atlantic region only in an approximately 70-mile-wide band approximately centered on the Mason-Dixon line. At Marston Observatory, Maryland, about 10 miles s. of Westminster, Curt Roelle reports that the clouds finally cleared over Gemini just 10 minutes before the event, giving him time to locate the star and make a visual observation, but not enough time to hook up his video equipment. I set up a remote video station near Oxford, PA but returned to it and ran it as my only station. At the time, I thought I missed it, but a recent review of the video tape showed that I did record it. Read about the observations and see Andrew Lowe's circular fit here and an account of my (almost remote) observation here. Andrew finds a best-fitting circular fit with a diameter of 170.6 km, in good agreement with the expected 170 km diameter.
Occultation of 43 Tauri by (345) Tercidina in Europe, the 2nd best-observed event - updated 2002 Oct. 1
Around 0h UT Sept. 17, an occultation of the 5th-mag. star 43 Tauri by the 90-km asteroid (345) Tercidina was observed by dozens of observers in Europe, many of whom crossed national borders to time the event from other countries. It has surpassed the 1983 Sept. 11th occultation of 14 Piscium by (51) Nemausa as the 2nd-best-observed asteroidal occultation to date. The numerous observations obtained from northern France to Slovakia, including a reduction profile, are here. Jean Lecacheux and Raymond Dusser have plotted most of the currently known observation sites on a map here but Martin Federspiel has reported a few new German observations not shown. Read about dedication and organization for the event in eastern Europe here, and read about 43 Tauri's angular diameter and negligible diffraction effects here.
(656) Beagle occultation recorded at Goddard Observatory - new 2002 Nov. 26
Wayne Warren recorded an occultation lasting only about 1.5 seconds, indicating that he was near one of the limits, probably the southern one, using the 16-inch telescope at the Goddard Space Flight Center's Optical Facility in Beltsville, Maryland - read more here.
Binoculars Asteroidal Occultations, Oct. 16, Nov. 3 & 10 - updated 2002 Nov. 12
Read about what happened during these exciting events here. Several Washington-area observers tried the Nov. 2/3 Nephele occultation, but only Joe Sedlak was in the path and timed it from our area; other observations were made in New England, s.w. Pennsylvania, and at Morgantown, WV. None of these occultations had step events so the stars are single (that is, not very close doubles), except for pi Arietis, which is a spectroscopic binary of short period so far away that it could not be resolved by the Lindemannia occultation. Occultations of stars this bright are rare; no events like them (visible with binoculars and with asteroids this large) are predicted for populous parts of North America during all of 2003.
Alagasta Victory Snatched from the Jaws of Defeat - new 2002 Oct. 29
In a lucky break in the clouds 2 km north of the predicted northern limit near Ladysmith, VA, I videorecorded a 2.5-second occultation by Alagasta. It shows that persistence and keeping one's wits can pay off; read the lessons learned details here.
Occultation by (302) Clarissa on Sept. 28 UT was observed from Texas - new 2002 Oct. 1
The occultation of a 9th-mag. star was observed near Wichita Falls, Texas by David Ryle (4 seconds duration) and by Wayne Hutcheon (6.1- second duration), who drove there from the Houston area. Ed Vinson timed a 6.5-second occultation from Justiceburg, Texas. These observations showed that Steve Preston's prediction was quite accurate. Observers a little farther south relative to the path, in Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, and France, have reported no occultation. Thick clouds from the remains of tropical storm Isidore prevented observation from West Virginia to New Jersey; it cleared up nicely a few hours after the occultation. Click here for prediction information about the Sept. 27/28 Clarissa event.
Occultation by (10) Hygiea observed from S. Carolina to Vermont - new 2002 Sept. 9
The occultation Friday night, Sept. 7/8, was observed near midnight EDT from at least 10 stations in the eastern USA, but so far there are no known observations from the eastern half of the path that included eastern New England, where it was clear. More information about this event will be posted here in a few days.
Occultation by Valentine didn't occur, Alberta to Maryland - updated 2002 Aug. 29
The occultation of a 10.8-mag. star by 447 Valentine did not occur along the planned path. Read about several miss observations here and see where the actual path went, based on new post-event accurate astrometric observations made at USNO, Flagstaff, AZ, here. Actually, the path must have passed at least 1/4 path-width north of that path, based on Alin Tolea's miss observation at the Bloomberg Observatory at Johns Hopkins University a few miles north of downtown Baltimore; that is within the uncertainty of the new calculation (by Steve Preston), which is still more than half a path-width one-sigma.
Occultation by Scheila in NC Outer Banks, Sat. am, May 25
I videorecorded a 9-second occultation of 9.9-mag. SAO 184638 by 596 Scheila starting at 9:12:12.0 U.T. using an 8-inch SCT with a PC-164C camera, from the parking lot of the Bodie Island lighthouse in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Unfortunately, this was the only observation of this occultation, due to equipment problems at another site about 25 km to the south and clouds in Georgia.
Occultation by Cheruskia seen in MD and WV, Sun. am, June 9
The occultation of an 11.6-mag. star by 568 Cheruskia was video recorded from stations at the Goddard Optical Facility and west of Hughesville, MD. The event may have been recorded at a 3rd station north of Hughesville as well, and the event was timed visually from 3 stations in West Virginia, including one not far from the southern limit. The path shifted a few tenths of a path width south, as indicated by visual miss observations made near New Winsor and north of Odenton, MD. A finder chart is here. A station list and other details are in the plain ASCII text file here.
Roger Venable timed a rare GRAZING occultation by (361) Bononia Wed. evening, 2002 Jan. 30 (EST)/31 (UT), and the star may be a very close binary. Read his interesting account of this event, as well as that for another occultation by the asteroid seen in Kiev in October, here.
Last Dec. 18th's Boliviana path shifted south by nearly 2 path-widths relative to the nominal path shown on my map on p. 119 of the February 2001 issue of Sky and Telescope. For some more about this rather good North American event (observation reports) click here.
The 2001 March 15th Diotima Occultation - updated 2002 Feb. 8
VBO data show that SAO 120035 is double. The results and reduction profile can be found here.
The 2001 March 6th Hypatia Occultation - updated 2002 Feb. 8
Six chords were timed from Florida to Alberta; the results and reduction profile can be found here.
1558 Jarnefelt occultation timed by HART Mar. 27 - updated 2002 Feb. 11
The 2s event shows that Topeka, KS was near either the northern or southern limit and that the updated prediction was quite accurate.
The 2000 November 20th appulse of Tejat by 752 Sulamitis
The disappointing mu Geminorum/Sulamitis results - 2000 Dec. 1
