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The news story "A star eclipsed by an asteroid in France this week-end: how and why scientists ask you to observe it" (in French) relates how people were are asked to look at the occultation of HD 51593 by asteroid Eurybates, one of the targets of space probe Lucy. The article explains how multiple observations of this occultation could help refine Eurybates' trajectory. The last paragraph states (my translation):

More than 700 willing observers have already registered for this week-end. Similar experiences in the late 80's in the US didn't reach more than 200 observers...

But there is no source to this claim, and the linked page of the French Astronomy Association, organizing this citizen science project, does not mention it. So I'd like to ask:

Which citizen science occultation experiences were done in the late 80's in the US? What were the achievements of these experiences?

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    $\begingroup$ Pretty impressive that they coordinated 200 people pre-internet. $\endgroup$
    – Jon Custer
    Oct 22, 2022 at 16:23
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    $\begingroup$ I'm not in the USA, but I vaguely remember amateurs contributing to measurements of lunar occultations of stars. $\endgroup$
    – PM 2Ring
    Oct 22, 2022 at 17:32
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    $\begingroup$ In the 1970's I remember reading about upcoming occultations of different types and am pretty sure there were invitations to send timing data by post. There were occasional offers to send predictions to anyone who mailed a letter with their lat/lon coordinates and elevation, which was a fun challenge for a kid before personal GPS receivers; it was a trip to the library. I got one prediction back with an apology for being late; "I left the letters in my banjo case playing with my bluegrass band" it mentioned. I think this was someone from NASA/JPL. I was impressed: "NASA folks are people too!" $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Oct 23, 2022 at 0:25
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    $\begingroup$ @uhoh Thank you for your input, I appreciate it even if (or because?) it is anecdotal! :) $\endgroup$
    – Jean-Marie Prival
    Oct 27, 2022 at 15:20
  • $\begingroup$ Did you already contact the authors of the news article? $\endgroup$
    – Grimaldi
    Jan 19 at 18:40

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