[Launch Alert] L-2 Weather Forecast

Sat Apr 9 22:13:31 EDT 2005

                             LAUNCH ALERT

			            Brian Webb
		         Ventura County, California
		         E-mail: kd6nrp at earthlink.net
	         Web Site: http://www.spacearchive.info

				             2005 April 9 (Saturday) 19:08 PDT
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                        L-2 WEATHER FORECAST

Monday morning's Minotaur launch from Vandenberg AFB appears to be on
schedule. Earlier today the 30th Weather Squadron issued an L-2
weather forcast for the base. The key points are as follows:

Cloudcover:

      Type       Coverage     Bases (ft)     Tops (ft)
     -------     --------     ----------     ---------
     Stratus      8/8ths           500          1,500
     Cirrus       4/8ths        26,000         30,000

Visibility: 2 to 4 miles

Weather: Fog

Overall probability of violating weather constraints: 0%

If I'm interpreting the forecast correctly, cloud layers will hamper
launch viewing near the base, but the probability of the weather
conditions preventing the launch is 0%.

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                             ODD REPORT

I recently received an interesting e-mail from David Levasheff
regarding something he saw from Mexico during the week of March
20-April 3. He wrote:

"I was down in Sayulita Mexico last week. Near Puerto Viallarta. We
were finished with dinner and drinks (10 of us) at around 8:30 MST
when we noticed an orange object in the eastern sky rising between
Ursa Major and Leo. Got the 8x binocs but could not see any difference
in the object. It slowly moved up higher in the sky. I went down
stairs to change my camera lens to a 300mm with 1.4TC and took a
couple of long exposures hand held. Exif info is 8:35. I went back
upstairs and by then the object had taken a right turn and moved into
Leo and faded away. A couple of nights later some of the party I was
with saw the object again. Only thing I can think is that it was a
weather baloon, but would like to know for sure..."

I have no idea what David saw. Do any of you have an explanation?

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