Did I see space debris?

What was racing through the sky Tuesday, June 14th between 3:30 am--4:30 am?. I often go outside at this time of night to gaze at the sky through my telescope or just my binoculars. I live in a rural area in East Central Texas and astronomy is one of my hobbies.

I have seen many "shooting stars" and this one was different. It shot across the night sky just like a meteorite burning up in the atmosphere, but it trailed a wide, colorful tail behind it. The color appeared blue with an orange or yellow border on the sides of its tail. From my perspective, it was in the southeastern sky.

Does anyone know if there were any satellites or other space garbage that was quite large and fell out of orbit at the time I said at the beginning of this message?

Riches profit not in the day of wrath...

Sounds like space debris. How long did it last?

I think Norad identifies such things.

Compare it to this.

archives.thedaily.washington.edu...

news.bbc.co.uk...

Thanks for the links!! Unfortunately, it doesn't describe what I saw.

It resembled the tail of a comet, only it sped across the sky in a nearly horizontal path going from west to east until it disappeared. What I saw lasted only seconds....perhaps 3 sec.

Sounds like a fire ball, I have seen quite a few over the years. I think that actual scientific name of them is a bolide.

[edit on 6/18/2005 by defcon5]

yea, i've seen two in the past six months. one, in vancouver BC (december '04), and then another recently here in london, ontario (april-may-ish '05). it was weird, and lasted only a brief moment, as it streaked across the sky. both looked generally the same. so my guess is it's probablly something of that nature, but who knows.

Here is a really big one, if the pic links...lol

Each of course looks unique. Color size, explosions, direction, if it entered in the atmosphere or bounced back out .



Fireball, BIG FILE - 5.7MB

[edit on 6/18/2005 by defcon5]

(Mod edit to link to large image)

[edit on 6/18/2005 by Amorymeltzer]

Fireball seems to fit the description quite well. Of course, since this was a TEXAS fireball -- it was probably "bigger"

BTW, am I on the right board for questions and observations about what I see when I'm star-gazing?

"Once more unto the breach" Shakespeare

www.badastronomy.com...

Here this is most likely a better one, though there are a number of guys like Commander Keen Kid that know their stuff about astronomy on ATS, Bad Astronomy is a site dedicated to it. I believe there are a number of members of this board on that board as well.



[edit on 6/18/2005 by defcon5]

I had a similar strange experience seeing something fall from the sky on the night of Wednesday the 15th of June. I live in Australia and was out with friends and we were driving past this big vacant block of land and all of a sudden I spotted a red light falling from the sky fairly high up.

The light got brighter as it headed toward ground, this object was much too big to be a flare and it seemed to land over the horizon with what sounded like a deep boom and compared to the landmarks, such as buildings, on the horizon this was no small object. All 6 people in the car saw and heard the exact same thing and were completely puzzled.

After having talked with other people about what we saw, we found out that at least one other person we knew had seen the same object from the other side of the city. After sitting there talking about what we had seen, we were certain there would be some sort of media coverage but nope, not a word. Strange stuff...

[edit on 18-6-2005 by Gazrok]

Hello to Downunder

The 15th in Australia is the 14th here in Texas. so the timing is close, but there was no sound with what I saw.

Strangely, my husband and I heard ( and felt) a loud "boom" 2 days ago. When he went into town, he asked others what they thought it was. It was believed to be a "sonic boom".

We don't live anywhere near an airport or a military base. Furthermore, sonic booms have been more or less outlawed since the 1960's. Our media did not carry any information about the event either.

It really causes one to wonder what exactly is happening.

Yes saw something similar in England UK a few years ago it was geen in colour. It was never detected, similar happenings in Russia too.