Hi to all, For those interested or concerned, I have pasted below some specific information on planet x / kx26
supplied to me in August 2001 by Gary W Kronk from The American Meteor Society.
http://cometography.com
http://comets.amsmeteors.org
He made some very convincing points.
Hope it is helpful.
Regards,
Grant Heard.
 

Grant, this is another example of misinformation which tries to fuel
conspiracy beliefs. My answer to this may seem a little wordy, but I
would like to inform you of a process that has been in place for
decades and make some comparisons to minor planet 2001 KX76.

Every clear night finds the telescopes of professional and amateur
astronomers pointing at the sky. The vast majority of these observers
are looking at known objects, while a handful of observatories and
amateur astronomers are actually on the lookout for objects never
seen before--either faint asteroids and comets orbiting within the
solar system that were somehow missed in the past or long-period
comets that are returning after thousands or millions of years in
space. The truth is that any one of these astronomers can find
something new at any time. Yes, the people searching will probably be
more successful, but the list of people who have accidentally found
comets and asteroids while looking for something else in the sky is
quite long.

No matter who finds the moving object, the procedures are always the same:

1. Determine the position.
2. Check available predictions for known asteroids and comets. Is
this object already known?
3. If new, announce the discovery to the Central Bureau for
Astronomical Telegrams (CBAT).
4. CBAT sends telegrams to various astronomers asking for confirmation.
5. Astronomers acquire positions for a rough orbit, so that others
can begin observations.
6. As positions become available, more precise orbits can be
determined. The longer the object is under observation the more
accurate will be its orbit.

Once a few positions are known, some basic assumptions are made
before the first orbits are determined. These orbits are very
important and allow astronomers around the world to turn their
telescopes to a particular position and observe the new object. The
first assumption is based on the physical appearance. If it is
star-like, it is probably an asteroid, if it is fuzzy looking, it is
probably a comet. Most comets have very long-period orbits, so
astronomers determine the first orbits by assuming the comet is
moving in a parabolic orbit. For asteroids, the vast majority move in
orbits that are basically circular, but this assumption must be
supplemented with the knowledge of the object's average speed, so
that the distance from the sun is being estimated by the object's
average motion. The slower the object moves, the farther away from
the sun it must be.

2001 KX76 was discovered on 2001 May 22 by astronomers at Cerro
Tololo Observatory in Chile. The motion was very slow--roughly equal
to what would be expected if the object was moving within or near the
Kuiper Belt--asteroids outside the orbit of Neptune and Pluto. A
rough circular orbit based on this very slow motion was issued to a
handful of observatories and this enabled astronomers at Las Campanas
Observatory to find the object on June 9 and astronomers at Lowell
Observatory to find it on June 19. The positions in June were a few
seconds of arc off from what the preliminary circular orbit had
predicted, indicating the actual orbit was not much different from a
circle. Brian Marsden of CBAT computed a new orbit using all of the
available positions and found that a slightly elliptical orbit would
fit the available positions quite well. The discovery was officially
announced on July 1.

Now how accurate is this orbit likely to be? Admittedly, the first
orbit was an educated guess, but Marsden's elliptical orbit indicates
that the guess was not far off. The longer 2001 KX76 is observed the
more accurate the orbit becomes. The most recent observation
registered for this object was obtained on July 27 by astronomers at
Klet Observatory in the Czech Republic. Admittedly Marsden's orbit
did not precisely match the object's measured position on that date,
but the error was much less than the errors between the June
observations and the preliminary circular orbit. Therefore, Marsden's
orbit is much more accurate than the circular orbit was and the
resulting revised orbit was only slightly different than his first
elliptical orbit.

This new orbit proves 2001 KX76 is a member of the Kuiper Belt. It
will never cross Neptune's orbit and can never pose a threat to any
planet in the solar system.

Now let me quickly address a couple of the issues mentioned in your
letter, so you can see the faults.

>This disinfo will change to something like a far away Nova (which gets
>larger as it explodes) in a few months as it nears and gets bigger. This
>
>campaign of lies will fall apart when they change their story and call
>it a Nova or an exploding red chunk of something.

Actually, they can never claim it is a nova, because novae do not
move across the sky. They are stationary with respect to the stars.
2001 KX76 has already moved considerably from its discovery position.

>Also they haven't
>dealt with or explained why it is red. All other objects in the vicinity
>are whitish or blueish.

This is a great line, because it relies exclusively on the
discovery.com article and this shows how issues can arise by mistakes
made by the media. The object is reddish in real life, but so are
most asteroids. The funny thing about the discovery.com article is
that it points out that the reddish object is the asteroid. In
reality, both the bluish and reddish objects are the same asteroid.
This image was produced to show the motion of the asteroid against
the starry background over a particular period of time.

>
>In March 2003, during its final 3 months before passage,
>the bright light of our sun will be reflecting off of it.

This object is moving extremely slowly, as all objects do at that
great distance. There is no way in the world that any comet,
asteroid, or any other physical object could move over 4 billion
miles in less than two years. Comet Hale-Bopp, which was bright in
our skies when it passed closest to the sun in early 1997, has taken
four years to move from 0.9 AU from the sun to 14 AU from the sun.
2001 KX76 is located 43 AU from the sun. Comet Hale-Bopp will
continue to slow as each year goes by and will take over two decades
to reach a distance comparable to 2001 KX76.

[Next comes some bizarre spectulation about the object being a brown
dwarf star--an idea with no basis in reality.]

>In this case take note of
>the ultra sophiticated terms "Large Reddish Chunk of Something" that are
>used to identify it.

This descriptive phrase was used in the discovery.com article and not
in any of the press releases or papers published so far.

Sincerely,
Gary
--

Date: Sat, 2 Mar 2002 12:47:34 +1030
Subject: [UFOFacts] Planet X / KX76
From: UFOFacts@yahoogroups.com
To: (mareno@castles.com)