Comet on a String: Cosmos and Comet Holmes

 

I showed this photograph to Paul Sventek and told him when the exposure
ended, how long the exposure was, and the latitude and longitude of the telescope.

Paul's into satellites. I asked if he could tell me what the interloper was.

You bet. 523 miles up, the cold war goes on. It's Cosmos 1603,
the first Tselina electronic intelligence satellite flown by
the Soviet Union on September 29, 1984. The orbit of this
satellite is almost perfectly circular. That and the fact that it is
moderately high -- free of atmospheric drag, low enough to
pile up a lot of orbits -- gives it continuing value as a gravity probe.

 

Paul identified the satellite using Mike McCant's FINDSAT software and
generated this map using Chris Marriott's SkyMap.

 

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Cameras behind Telescopes:
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Text & Photos by David Cortner
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