[meteorite-list] Happy Birthday, Meteorite Men!

From: Richard Kowalski <*damoclid_at_meteoritecentral.com*> Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2011 16:41:07 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <931090.42385.qm_at_web113613.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> · damoclid_at_meteoritecentral.com

--
Richard Kowalski
Full Moon Photography
IMCA #1081
--- On Sat, 2/5/11, Rob Matson <mojave_meteorites at cox.net> wrote:
> From: Rob Matson <mojave_meteorites at cox.net>
> Subject: [meteorite-list] Happy Birthday, Meteorite Men!
> To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Date: Saturday, February 5, 2011, 2:38 PM
> Hi All,
> 
> First off, happy birthday greetings to Geoff and Steve -- I
> hope
> you both had a fabulous time at your Birthday Bash last
> night at
> the Sky Bar, and that your bar tabs were covered by
> everyone
> else.? ;-)? I really wish I could have made it to
> Tucson again
> this year, but it's been crunch-time at work getting our
> ground
> software operational for our satellite launch in less than
> six
> months. I owe you both a belated birthday cocktail the next
> time
> our paths cross (hopefully in some farflung strewn field!)
> 
> I got an e-mail from Bob Verish this morning, informing me
> that
> I won a Harvey Award last night!! I am honored and humbled
> and
> (as I wrote Geoff privately a little while ago)
> simultaneously
> a bit horrified that I couldn't be there in person last
> night
> to accept it. It would have been a special treat to share
> the
> stage with NEO-hunter-extraordinaire, Richard Kowalski, who
> I
> understand also won a Harvey.
> 
> As long as I'm on the subject of asteroids, I'd like to
> share
> with the List a little early birthday gift that I
> presented
> Geoff late last year, but decided to wait until his
> birthday
> to announce publically:
> 
> MPC 72991 citation:
> 
> (132904) Notkin = 2002 RB237
> ? ???Geoffrey Notkin (b. 1961) is
> co-host of the popular Science Channel
> series Meteorite Men and author of over 100 articles on
> meteoritics,
> paleontology and the arts.? A discoverer of meteorites
> on four continents,
> he has also made documentaries for Discovery, National
> Geographic, PBS, the
> BBC and the History Channel.
> 
> - - - - -
> 
> Minor planet dynamical group:? Hilda
> Semi-major axis:? 3.9982764 a.u.
> Inclination: 3.55428 degrees
> Eccentricity: 0.1440889
> Perihelion distance:? 3.422169 a.u.
> Aphelion distance:? 4.574384 a.u.
> Absolute magnitude: 14.4
> 
> Astrometry from 89 observations at 6 oppositions spanning
> 1995-2010
> Last observed:? 10/9/2010 by station G96
> Discovery date : 2002 09 12
> Discovery site : Palomar
> Discoverer : Matson, R. 
> 
> The Hildas are interesting in that they are in a 2:3
> orbital resonance
> with Jupiter: they complete three orbits for every two
> Jovian orbits.
> The first Hilda asteroid was discovered in 1875. Currently
> there are
> only ~1100 Hildas known, which is less than 1/4 of a
> percent of all
> known asteroids. They are very dark objects, with a mean
> albedo of
> only 0.044 -- similar to cometary nuclei. Based on this
> albedo and
> an absolute magnitude of 14.4, (132904) has an approximate
> size of
> 8.4 km. That's a cross-sectional area very close to the
> size of
> Manhattan, with which Geoff should be quite familiar. :-)
> Assuming
> a bulk density of 1.5 g/cm^3, that corresponds to a mass of
> around
> 4.6 x 10^11 metric tons -- around a half trillion metric
> tons!
> 
> Congratulations, Geoff, and welcome to the minor planet
> club!
> 
> Best wishes,
> Rob
> 
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