------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 1757 2002 Mar 24 10.30UT Ed:Guy M Hurst, 16,Westminster Close, Kempshott Rise, Basingstoke, Hants, RG22 4PP,England.Telephone/FAX(01256)471074Int:+441256471074 INTERNET: GUY@TAHQ.DEMON.CO.UK GMH at AST.STAR.RL.AC.UK WORLD WIDE WEB http://www.theastronomer.org ------------------------------------------------------------------- OCCULTATION OF RHO2 CANCRI BY (1819) LAPUTA Richard Miles draws out attention to a predicted occultation tonight (March 24/25) of rho2 Cancri, a bright magnitude 5.2 star by the asteroid (1819) Laputa, a small of about 45km. The predicted shadow path runs over the western half of France (00:01.5-00:04 UT), west England and Wales (00:04-00:05 UT) and Northern Ireland (00:05.5 UT). However the prediction is rather uncertain, spanning about 7 path-widths (about 300 km) and so the event might be witnessed from anywhere in the UK, Ireland, France and Catalonia, Spain. Where the star is occulted, it will disappear completely for up to a maximum of 8 or 9 seconds. The position of the star is: RA 08h 55m 39.7s DEC +27o 55' 39" (2000). Although the Moon will be 80% illuminated and 7 degrees south of the target, the star is so bright that this should not interfere with observations. Visual timing observations are strongly encouraged. If you have the equipment then please try to video the event and time stamp the recording in some way (e.g. using the sound track to record audible time marks). Start observing at least 2 minutes before the predicted time for your location and continue for at least 4 minutes. Please send any results to Mark Kidger, TA Planetary Editor (contact details in the magazine) and also a copy to Richard: rmiles@baa.u-net.com COMET C/2002 C1 (IKEYA-ZHANG) Further to the note on E-circular 1755 showing updated orbital elements for this comet, Brian Marsden has commented on M.P.E.C. 2002-F21 as follows: The latest orbital elements yield the year of the previous perihelion passage as T = 1660.9 +/- 0.4 (1 sigma), in very close agreement with the value T = 1661.1 for comet C/1661 C1. Guy M Hurst