Great events have happened on 29 September 2001......Starshine 3 was deployed and my football team, the Brisbane Lions (playing Australian Rules Football), won their first ever Grand Final. This was played in Melbourne, 2000km south of Brisbane, in front of 92,000 people.
I arrived home from Melbourne yesterday afternoon at around 1800 hours. Straight to the computer to see if a launch had taken place. YES!!!!! As luck would have it Starshine was passing overhead at 1900hrs. What a sight. Right on cue in the tail of Scorpius. Two brilliant flashes. It was if she was taking two flash photographs of us here. Fantastic!!
Petar Nikolic
Loganlea State High School
Logan City, Queensland, Australia
My students at Davis Creek Elementary and I read up on StarShine 3 so that we could view it this evening, October 2, 2001, at 7:49 in the WSW sky. I went outside from my evening job at the Career Technology Learning Center to see the satellite.
It was beautiful. It is so much clearer than StarShine 1. The flashes came in three quick segments that were clearly visible across the sky. Even when the satellite was descending the flashes could be seen, while the satellite itself was not visible. StarShine 3 was about as bright as Mars in our Barboursville, West Virginia sky.
The adults here went with me to see StarShine 3 and are now reading your web site with interest. When will we get to set up an observation site? I can't wait to see it again, but I will have to wait until October 8, 2001 on its next pass. Thank you so much for this great opportunity.
Sharon Simon, Instructor
ABE West Virginia
Career Technology Learning Center
Huntington, WV