Asteroid Occultations 2018, Jan-Feb reported.

[Tim Haymes]

2018 has got off to a good start with half-a-dozen asteroid occultations reported so far. The opportunity to observe these events improves year on year. When Gaia returns information on asteroids this will enhance our chances and planning.  For the brighter stars look at Steve Preston’s web page http://www.asteroidoccultation.com/, and for a comprehensive UK list, see UKOCL maintained by John Talbot (Reading AS)  http://ukoccultations.info/

Our aim as observers of this phenomenon is to get timings of the same stellar asteroidal occultation from different locations within the shadow and form a profile. We achieve this by collaboration with EAON, an observer network which publishes results here:  http://www.euraster.net/

A recent shape profile with observations matched to it  (curtesy of E. Frappa ) :
http://www.euraster.net/results/2018/20180213-Euphrosyne_crd+DAMIT1066.gif

and another without a model:  http://www.euraster.net/results/2018/20180213-Brixia_crd.gif

Clear skies….Tim
( Asteroid & Remote Planet – Occultations)

[Nick James]

Those are really useful resources although it took me a while to realise that the “Event” heading in the table here was actually the date!

[Tim Haymes]

Nick,
Ahh yes,I see.  BTW:  The  author has now extend the event list to include 14th mag stars.  I observed one the other night. Not many nights pass when there isnt an opportunity to observe a prediction.  We also have predictions for Comet Nuclei
(not in this list though).

Tim

[Alex Pratt]

Most observers of this asteroidal occultation have now reported their timings and the asteroid’s profile (derived from multiple chords) has been updated on Euraster (maintained by Eric Frappa). There’s still one or two reports to come in. There looks to be some discrepancies in the set of chords.

I’ll add the shape profile link to the observation on my member’s page.

Clear skies,

     Alex.

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