Something in the sky...

Hi everybody

Last night while I was driving home from my aikido class with my friend we were talking and spotting UFOs (every bright star I could see I'd say 'Ooh look, a UFO') then we got to a long straight bit of road and I noticed a big orange star appear in front of us, looked about the same size as Venus appears in the sky but it was almost directly north. I said to my friend 'Ooh look, a UFO' and he said it was just a star, but then as we both watched, it faded and disappeared!
There were only a few whispy clouds in the sky and none in the region this appeared in.

Any ideas what it could have been? It didn't reappear all the rest of the journey home.

Oh yeah, we were driving North, coming out of Nottingham towards Rainworth in the UK, about 9pm.

Any airport near this location?

Could have been an aircraft banking with landing gears down.

0,02$

Possible, but it was only visible for about 5 seconds, then was gone. Usually planes take a little longer on their manoeuvres and you can usually see at least 1 light from them after they've changed direction too.

The nearest main airport is off to the east about 15 miles or so, with another small airstrip off to the north another 25 miles.

You probably saw a satellite as it moved into earth's shadow, which is why it disappeared. Also, satellites appear to move slower (due to perspective) when they are near the horizon. They can almost appear to stand still, especially if you only see them for a short period of time.

It was pretty high in the sky, not near the horizon and it wasn't moving visibly from when it faded into view to when it faded out again a few seconds later. I've never seen a satellite shine as bright as this was either, they're usually quite small faint points moving fairly quickly across the sky.

My thought as to what it could have been is possibly a meteor hitting the atmosphere and burning up, but there was no trail so if it was one it would have been falling directly towards us!

Or possibly even a star exploding? I don't know how long the explosion from a distant star would be visible for though, probably more than 5 seconds anyway. And if it were a star, surely some astronomers would have mentioned it somewhere.

I had pretty much the same experience a few days ago.
I love in Sutton / London area and saw a orange glow head directly up into the thing bank of clouds in the distance, I watched but didn't see anything emerge from the cloud.

Then it happened a couple of days later at near enough the same location but this time it WAS a plane coming towards me then heading to my left , ( right for the aircraft to take it towards Gatwick airport) , I am still thinking about the first sighting, seeing as I didn't see an aircraft emerge from the clouds doesn't mean that it didn't.

Or maybe is was one of these UFO's that imitate an aircraft to avoid observation?



[edit on 1/5/09 by DataWraith]

There have been quite a few of these sightings and I have even pointed them out to my son. 3 of these object ascended in the Northern night sky in February of last year. I pulled over and watched, making notes as I didnt have a camera with me. My stomach dropped slightly as I watched, and we both thought 'WoW!'
We quickly got in the car and drove to our house which was only a short distance away and watched from his bedroom window, with me taking notes on direction etc.
Then they faded

I now suspect strongly, it was One Of These!

The OP doesn't mention the time when the light was observed, butthe general description sounds very much like a typical Iridium Flare.

This is easy to confirm by registering with the Heavens Above Website.

This will allow anyone to research their observations of lights in the sky.
So, entering the coordinates of Nottingham, UK into the database allows you to see if there were/will be any bright light phenomena due to Iridium Flares.

This is what I got:



You can see that there wasindeed a very bright flare in the Northern sky at about half past nine on the evening concerned. The altitude was around 20 degrees and the brightness was magnitude -6. This is unusually bright (about five times brighter than Venus as a rough guide). The flares always last for a few seconds only, but can be quite spectacular.

I guess the only bummer in this will be if the OP reports a completely different time.

WG3

Originally posted by doogle
Hi everybody

....... and I noticed a big orange star appear in front of us, looked about the same
There were only a few whispy clouds in the sky and none in the region this appeared in......

Any ideas what it could have been? It didn't reappear all the rest of the journey home.

OMG....that happened to me this morning. I went outside to get my bike to ride to work when I looked up and saw exactly the same thing. A big orange star. I screamed for about a minute until my neighbour came out and calmed me down. I said "do you see it, that big orange star strangely emitting light and warmth..." he said "yes, that is the sun". I was shocked I can tell you.

On a serious note. Can't help you. Might be worth checking to see what satilites where flying over.

If it was a meteor, it would be likely that you would see it moving. "Point meteors" (meteors that head directly towards you and don't appear to move) are quite rare, and it is possible you saw one, but just having no tail does not make it a point meteor.

5 seconds is quite long for a meteor (although much longer is possible), so I think a satellite is a more likely explanation in this case, but it could have been a meteor. Sometimes it can be hard to tell for sure, but I would follow waveguide's advice and check the times for flares in that location.

Originally posted by waveguide3
The OP doesn't mention the time when the light was observed, butthe general description sounds very much like a typical Iridium Flare.

This is easy to confirm by registering with the Heavens Above Website.

This will allow anyone to research their observations of lights in the sky.
So, entering the coordinates of Nottingham, UK into the database allows you to see if there were/will be any bright light phenomena due to Iridium Flares.

This is what I got:

You can see that there wasindeed a very bright flare in the Northern sky at about half past nine on the evening concerned. The altitude was around 20 degrees and the brightness was magnitude -6. This is unusually bright (about five times brighter than Venus as a rough guide). The flares always last for a few seconds only, but can be quite spectacular.

I guess the only bummer in this will be if the OP reports a completely different time.

WG3

That is about the time I saw it so it very likely was that flare!
I finish my aikido class at about 8:45 and it's roughly 40 mins drive home so it could have been the flare at 9:35 I saw, especially since we popped into the supermarket before setting out home, which would have added another 15-20 mins or so to the time it took to get home.

Thanks for clearing this up for me, glad to have seen one of them things if that's what it was