NOSS 3-3 just passed over right on time. As they (there were 2 in the formation) passed through the bucket of the Big Dipper they were slightly fainter than Megrez which I looked up and found it's about mag 3.3. Easily naked eye. But less than a minute later it passed by and was slightly fainter than Alpha Canes Venatici which I see is mag 5.6. But then as many here may know, a drop off like that is normal for a morning pass (just the opposite of an evening pass where they tend to get brighter with time). Time for bed, Patrick Patrick Wiggins wrote:
Chuck Hards wrote:
I stepped outside this morning to look at the sky, and noticed a pair of satellites in formation. They were identical in brightness, about 4th magnitude, traveling northwest to southeast and passing high overhead. I followed them from Ursa Major through the tail of Leo, the rearmost passing just a few arc-minutes from Denebola. They were a couple of degrees apart (crude estimation, I'm at work and away from my atlases) and stayed in formation rigidly. Without going to a lot of trouble, can someone who follows such things ID this pair, or at least classify them? This is the first formation I've seen from light-polluted SL valley location. TIA.
I saw my particular constellation this morning within a few minutes of 6 am MST.
Looks like you spotted NOSS 3-3.