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Occultation by Gonnessia
August 15 2020 The Asteroid Gonnessia is a 99km wide asteroid orbiting between Mars and Jupiter. It is very black, with an albedo of only 3%. On August 15, it occulted a 12th magnitude star named UCAC-399-084279, as viewed from a narrow swathe of the Earth including Auckland, NZ. This was detectable when the light from the background star flickered out for 7.75 seconds. By capturing the light curve, precise information can be obtained about the orbit of the asteroid, as well as its shape as its shadow traverses the earth at over 6.4 km/second. By contributing these observations to the Occultation Section of the astronomical community, our scientific knowledge of the cosmos is enhanced. Captured with my 120mm Refractor from central Auckland as a video with 250ms integration frames. Processed using Tangra to produce the light curve shown to the left. Here is the predicted path and other information about the occultation. |
