Near Earth Asteroid Alert: 4179 Toutatis approaches...

According to the ephemeris in my BAA Handbook, this object is going to
*brush* past the Earth at just 1 million miles ( 0.015 AUs) at
closest approach in late September, and reach an impressive magnitude
of +7.1

Anyone know of any pre-prepared charts that can be used to track the
approach? I think its around magnitude 11.6 at the moment. Here's some
background from a previous close approach:-

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast31oct_1.htm

AAI
================================================== ===
http://uk.geocities.com/aa_spaceagent/astronomy.html
================================================== ===

The September issue of Astronomy Now has an article starting on page 25. Map
and ephemeris included.
Grim

"AA Institute" wrote in message
om...
According to the ephemeris in my BAA Handbook, this object is going to
*brush* past the Earth at just 1 million miles ( 0.015 AUs) at
closest approach in late September, and reach an impressive magnitude
of +7.1

Anyone know of any pre-prepared charts that can be used to track the
approach? I think its around magnitude 11.6 at the moment. Here's some
background from a previous close approach:-

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast31oct_1.htm

AAI
================================================== ===
http://uk.geocities.com/aa_spaceagent/astronomy.html
================================================== ===

Generically, you can obtain asteroid orbital elements and enter them
into any of several freeware and shareware planetarium programs.
Here's a good place to start:
http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/data/ELEMENTS.NUMBR

Then, you can look up JPL's space calendar
http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/calendar
to see if anything is happening, and of course, you can to a "Find" on
the page to look for a string of text. entering "Tout", this entry was
first up:
"Sep 29 - Asteroid 4179 Toutatis Near-Earth Flyby (0.010 AU)"
with a link to a page of info on the asteroid.


"Grimble Gromble" wrote:
The September issue of Astronomy Now has an article starting on page 25.
Map and ephemeris included.
Grim

"AA Institute" wrote
According to the ephemeris in my BAA Handbook, this object is going to
*brush* past the Earth at just 1 million miles ( 0.015 AUs) at closest
approach in late September, and reach an impressive magnitude
of +7.1

Anyone know of any pre-prepared charts that can be used to track the
approach? I think its around magnitude 11.6 at the moment. Here's some
background from a previous close approach:-

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast31oct_1.htm

AAI
================================================== ===
http://uk.geocities.com/aa_spaceagent/astronomy.html
================================================== ===

Taken from this months S&T: (BTW, Well Done Peter Lawrence, will we be doing
parallax exp with this Object?))

HTTP://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/MPEph/MPEph.html

Then (using Internet Explorer only) choose "return ephmerides" for name
enter "Toutatis" enter start date in the form yyy mm dd hhmm then enter east
longtitude (ie 360 deg - western long) Northern latitudes = +deg south
as -. Under format, choode "none"

Haven't tried it but I hope it helps

Regards


Chris


"AA Institute" wrote in message
om...
According to the ephemeris in my BAA Handbook, this object is going to
*brush* past the Earth at just 1 million miles ( 0.015 AUs) at
closest approach in late September, and reach an impressive magnitude
of +7.1

Anyone know of any pre-prepared charts that can be used to track the
approach? I think its around magnitude 11.6 at the moment. Here's some
background from a previous close approach:-

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast31oct_1.htm

AAI
================================================== ===
http://uk.geocities.com/aa_spaceagent/astronomy.html
================================================== ===

In sci.astro.amateur "Chris Taylor" not.tellin wrote:
: Taken from this months S&T: (BTW, Well Done Peter Lawrence, will we be doing
: parallax exp with this Object?))

: HTTP://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/MPEph/MPEph.html

: Then (using Internet Explorer only) choose "return ephmerides" for name

As noted in a letter I sent to S&T within 10 minutes of reading that
piece, there is no "Internet Explorer only" requirement on ANY
of the MPC's pages. I really have no idea where or why they imagined that
there was such a requirement. As the author of most of the pages and
all of the form scripts on the MPC site, I can assure you that the
design philosophy has always been browser independence (no "best viewed
with..." icons on our pages). You can use any browser you want,
including text-based browsers: Lynx works on the MPEph.html page very
nicely, as it does with any non-graphical page or form script.

: Haven't tried it but I hope it helps

Other than the above-noted error, the rest of the instructions are
correct.


--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gareth V. Williams, MS 18, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.
Associate Director, IAU Minor Planet Center
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/mpc.html
OpenVMS & RISC OS: refined choices in operating systems

"Grimble Gromble" wrote in message ...
The September issue of Astronomy Now has an article starting on page 25. Map
and ephemeris included.
Grim

I wonder if #4179 Toutatis would make a good 'AsterCom' starship
candidate?!

A missed opportunity with such a close fly-by. If only some retro
thrust was applied... it might get captured into Earth orbit, after
which the "digging" expeditions could get to work on carving out its
interior!

Dreams...