Bright flashing "star" in sky

Hi all,

I have recently noticed a new "star" in the sky which is flashing all sorts of colours, it violently changes to red,green,blue,white... im not talking about regular flickering that you see every other star doing. It's also rather large.

I've been watching it the past 1.5 months and prior to this it was never visible or apparent in the sky. Its definately something new as ive never seen it before. Im no sky expert but I do watch the skies regularly.

Im seeing this from the southern hemisphere, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

If anyone has any information regarding this flashing star or light in the sky please post here.

Also if you too have noticed it please speak up and let me know your thoughts as to what it may be.

It has a funky orbit also, eg... i can see it in the west one night then the following night it's in the southern part of the sky. Or sometimes its west going down to the horizon towards the south-west... within an hour or so.

Sorry if this subject has been posted before but I seriously could not find anything through the search function.

Cheers.

[edit on 23-5-2008 by Nizzmo]

reply to post by Nizzmo

---

What you're describing sounds like normal scintillation.

"Scintillation or twinkling are generic terms for rapid variations in apparent brightness or color of a distant luminous object viewed through the atmosphere."

You need to describe how high the star is in relation to the horizon, preferably in degrees. If you want to know which star it is exactly, we need to know what time it's at a given location in the sky. Use a compass to find the azimuth and use your hands to find the altitude.

I will try my best when I get a chance... im not sure if I have a compass though.

I am aware of the effect you speak of, but this thing is of intense colour which is very bright and highly visible. If your looking at the sky this star will pretty much catch your eye in an instant.

I've looked at all the other stars to compare and is the only one doing this effect at this intensity. Also it looks to be the same star every night.

It looks very odd to be honest.

There was a very small article about this in the paper stating that its a newly discovered star forming or colliding/merging together with another star, but I can't be sure on the details. The article specified that it was reffering about a bright flashing star that is newly visible in the night sky.

The newspaper being the herald sun. I will try find this article online as I know it will give credibility to this thread.

This may be the article... it does not state whether it's visible to the naked eye though.

Link

Give heavens above a look, it's a pretty cool site, enter your latitude / longitude (use google earth to find that) and you can find out all sorts about what you can see - even when satellites will be visible... even during the day! I ain't done it yet, but if I know where I'll be at a certain time (BBQ for instance) have a look, sync your watch and point it out - looking all clever... or even magical

Also you could just have a look at google sky.

I see that effect all the time whenever a bright star is near the horizon. And yes, intense color is normal. Stars are point light sources, which means it's possible (and easy) for the atmosphere to refract specific wavelengths away from your eye, while other wavelengths of photons reach your eye successfully, resulting in rapidly shifting bright colors.

Then it's probably the brightest star near the horizon. The seasonal motion of the constellations is not fast, so it should appear at the same place at about the same time night after night.

Nothing in the article you linked to said that it should be visible to the naked eye, let alone new. In fact, J1903+0327 is a radio pulsar that was first detected by the Arecibo Radio Telescope. It's too dim for our optical telescopes to directly observe. It takes an infrared telescope to even see its companion star, which is approximately the same size as our sun, but at almost half a galaxy away it would be completely invisible to the naked eye and even large telescopes.

ngchunter: Well I wasn't sure if that was the correct article, actually now im pretty sure its not.

I also stated that it never mentions in the article that the star is visible to the naked eye. Either way it doesn't matter because it's the wrong article.

However I know exactly what you are talking about, I have no objection to what you are telling me.. it may just be scintillation, although ive witnessed stars much lower to the horizon than this star was but the effect was dull in comparison.

Im just wondering if anyone has seen this also, as a few of my mates have noticed this star and were also amazed of the intense and vivid colours this star was producing.

It looked like it was ready to explode. Crazy.

I will try get some video of it... if possible.

Interesting. Even though I enjoy looking at stars I didn't know about that flickering.
Got my own at the moment, looking at it from east London, looking south southeast. Pretty colors, changing from red to blue to white.
Apparently the ISS is around that position at the moment, so it might be that. It's just very aggressive

Got another one quite high up due south, that is very intense white. Seemed to brighten up for a moment and keep the intensity.

I tried to catch it on cam, but the one I have now is not good enough.

reply to post by flice

---

There are a few in the night sky, but the one I am seeing stands out above all the other stars. It's alot bigger and actually dwells in the colours for a second or two. Like when it turns red it stays red for a little bit then full changes to blue and stays like that for a bit then onwards.

I pulled out my dobsonian telescope so I could have a better look, after setting it up and finding the star I saw what looked like wobbling on the sides of the star.

Not sure what to make of it. Plus it travels quite quickly over the horizon. Although its not near the horizon when first spotting in the early night. Give it 2hours and its gone.

reply to post by Nizzmo

---

I live in Bowling Green, Kentucky and I know exactly what you are talking about.I have watched this thing in the sky for about a year or more.I don't know what it is but it FLASHES red,blue,and white.none of the other stars do this the way this object does.I have 20/20 vision and I know what a star looks like from earth.I believe this is a satallite of some sorts...or possibly a part of PROJECT BLUE BEAM.This object does have a strange orbit and is deffinately man made.at some parts of the year you can see it here closely and I trully think it's man made.I found this forum because I am looking for answers as to what this is and I have found nothing usefull.Everyone seems to act like it's just our eyes playing tricks....well frankly that ticks me off cause I know what I see and people try to downplay everything.Area 51.....weather balloons..U.F.O....swamp gas...so enough already.there is somthing up there that is flashing colors and it would be real nice if someone had some real info instead of trying to convince people that their eyes are playing tricks on them.

Scintillation is not your "eyes playing tricks on you." It's a well-established phenomenon that's the result of a point light source passing through a constantly-disturbed atmosphere like ours. The more atmosphere it must pass through, the greater the chance for heavy scintillation. What you're seeing is the result of the atmosphere, not your eyes. If you could tell me exactly what time, how high, and what direction (in degrees) it appears in I might be able to tell you what it is.

i´ve also noticed this star for the past week or so, i live in a village called cadaques on the costa brava in spain. i went for a walk last night & saw at least three of them quite close together in the sky

i also have a star like this, i live in maryland on the eastern shore (delmarva peninsula) and this star is like no other. i actually wonder if it is a star because it barely twinkles, it mainly changes colors at a constant pace. this is definately not a plane or anything like that because it does not move like one, it moves the same rate as the stars. i have not yet observed its orbit, but i suspect that it would be just like everyone else described it. at first me and my dad thought it might be a star dying or being born, but you think you would of heard about something like that on the news or something. this phenomenon is quite strange and it would be nice to figure out what the cause is.

I've seen a similar star over the past few years. It's usually in the Western sky, haven't tracked it to a particular season or time of the month or night, it sometimes there and sometimes not.

It's a fairly bright star but what makes it so odd and different from other "twinkling" stars is that it really does change color in flashes, red, green, yellow, blue... I have seen this same star also get very bright and fade within seconds. When I first saw this, I reported it to Mufon with all the details, time, latitudes, direction, etc and they had no explanation for me. Since then I've seen it enough to now not even bother with it. Me and my husband just joke about our "star" visiting us. I've tried to photograph and videotape it but I haven't had any success or surely I would have started a thread on it by now

oh and occasionally I've seen as many as 3 stars that exhibit the same strange light phenomenon in a single night.

btw I'm in south east florida.

I think that is Antares. What constellation(s) do you see at night time? Possibly Sagittarius?

[edit on 1-9-2008 by whiteblack]

I look at the night sky often because I love to do so and also because it's very beautiful. I'm a person with a very observant mind and a great memory. I track the moon's orbit like a hobby of mine while at the same time observing other stars, planets & whatever.

But anyway, I've been noticing a star as described like the one in this thread as well. Over the past 6-12 months at least. I'll see it once a week or so, (if I happen to be awake between 2-5am). But tonight, it was flashing A LOT brighter than usual. It must be a star because of the fact that it "flickers". Can't be an airplane because it has an exact orbit on a monthly basis and doesn't dissapper after 30 minutes or not at all. You can see it all night.

By the way, this is my position of observance- I'm in central Florida & I always see it at night time after midnight. Tonight I saw it @ 4am, stood there for 20 minutes, and it never went away. I tell you, it's freakin awesome. Brightest thing I've ever seen in the sky besides the moon. It's even craizier than airplane or helicopter lights. When I look at it, I'm facing east southeast, (I'd say the compass bearing is 100 degrees +/- 20 degrees @ it's height above the horizon at the time was about 20 degrees at 4am eastern.

It's very interesting surely. I have no idea what it is. Maybe planet X/Nibiru? If so, then that means planet x is not a planet; it would be a binary star. It's definetly not a UFO or an airplane, (I'm a pilot...I should know). One source on the internet describes the possibility of it being a Supernova. That hypoothesis is very plausible as well.

We'll figure it out soon. Tonight it was MUCH brighter and noticable and I probably haven't had a chance to see it in over a month. I thought to look it up on the net and this place is the only place that mentioned something close to the same description.

Well, keep in touch. I'll save this thread in my browser.

reply to post by Nizzmo

---

I too see this large so called star blinking violently changing colors for about 4 months now. It seems to be in the same area every night even in low visibility. I live in the washington dc area. I am very open minded to anything anyone has to say about it. I can't help but stare at it obssesively every night. I don't have a telescope, but I am ready to purchase one to investigate it furthur. If anyone has answers please post.

It's probably a Navy surveillance satelite;
BBC
Back in 1998 or 99, I was in my yard looking at the flashing stars- blue, red, yellow, green, when a neighbor who was in the first Gulf war as a sniper, came by.
He asked what I was looking at and told me it was a surveillance satelite and that if he had a grid, he could show me where they all were.
I asked, why they were over land, why were there so many and what were they 'surveilling'?

That BBC article says 'unblinking' lights, but, my friend said they flashed in synchronized colors for identification.

[edit on 18-9-2008 by Clearskies]

reply to post by Anonymous ATS

---

I live in central florida also & I noticed a bright star like you describe a few minutes ago. It caught my attention right away. I stared at it for a while & thought I'd see if I could find out if there was anything about it online. It's 9:50 pm on Sept 27,08. Southeasten sky about 11:00 high. I would say it was the brightest star I've ever seen. I wouldn't be surprised if it were a satellite, it looks unnatural & relatively close.