Jersey City, NJ UFO January 9 2010

Date of sighting?

January 9 2010

Time of sighting (include time zone, am or pm)?

7:30PM

How long did the sighting last?

Way over an hour

City, state of sighting (or nation, province, etc.)?

Jersey city, NJ on 5th ave, and on the intersection of palisade ave and 139. (took video from two different spots)

How many other witnesses?

Yes, my friend Glenn, his father, and a random guy off the street, and another friend.

Just lights, or shape discernible?

It was a round object. it looks pretty far, and pretty high. At first i thought it may be a plane, but it stayed stationary for over an hour. it wasn't a helicopter because it looked so damn high and was quite a distance away.

Color of lights and/or object/s?

It was pulsating, blue white, green, red.

Number of lights and/or objects?

Just one object, flashing lights. think of a police cruiser, but in the sky.

Apparent altitude?

Id say way up there. maybe a couple thousand feet?

Direction of travel?
It was stationary, at one point i thought it moved, but it was me and horrible camera skills.

Apparent brightness?

It was brights. I pointed at other stars, but it didint show up, but i pointed at the UFO, and it was visible.

Path of travel (straight, curved, etc.)?
None

Any pictures or video?

Yep, below!

Any sound?

It was too far away to hear if it made any noise.

Any aircraft around?

Its the hudson river, you have helecopters coming and going all the time, BUT this object was way higher than the copters i saw flying around, but not near or observing the object.

Can you illustrate what was seen (if no photos, video, etc.)? (even MS paint can be used to illustrate where things were during a sighting, etc.)

Well It was a white orb, pulsating red/white/blue/green, and very far away from where i was. the direction i am pointing in the video is south east, although in the video i said north/north east. I dont know why i said it in there, but oh well.

That was my UFO sighting.

I have NO idea what it was, i was trying to figure out if it was a helicopter (too high) a satellite (but didn't move at all) a blimp because of the football game. (Way too high, and no games were being played in the area. Jets played in Cincinnati.) it was basically stationary for more than an hour.

Here is the video:

Part One:


Part Two:


Part three:


Part Four:


Part five:


I can tell you now, i have NO clue what it is.

EDIT: Changed Date.

Ugh i still thought we were in 2009 X_X

[edit on 1/10/2010 by ugie1028]

Not a foo .But I would put money on it being a scintillating star en.wikipedia.org...

Scintillation or twinkling are generic terms for rapid variations in apparent brightness or color of a distant luminous object viewed through a medium, most commonly the atmosphere (atmospheric scintillation).

If the object lies outside the earth's atmosphere, as in the case of stars and planets, the phenomenon is termed astronomical scintillation; if the luminous source lies within the atmosphere, the phenomenon is termed terrestrial scintillation.

As one of the three principal factors governing astronomical seeing, atmospheric scintillation is defined as variations in illuminance only, and so twinkling does not cause blurring of astronomical images. It is clearly established that almost all scintillation effects are caused by anomalous refraction caused by small-scale fluctuations in air density usually related to temperature gradients. Normal wind motion transporting such fluctuations across the observer's line of sight produces the irregular changes in intensity characteristic of scintillation. The primary cause of such small-scale fluctuations is turbulent mixing of air with different temperatures.

Scintillation effects are always much more pronounced near the horizon than near the zenith (straight up). Parcels of air with sizes of the order of only centimeters to decimeters are believed to produce most of the scintillatory irregularities in the atmosphere. Atmospheric scintillation is measured quantitatively using a scintillometer.

Scintillation effects are reduced by using a larger receiver aperture. This effect is known as aperture averaging.

[edit on 10-1-2010 by Foo_Lovers]

I thought it was a star too, but i lived out here all my life, and i never saw a star do that before in the NYC/NJ area.

I am going to check back tomorrow in the same spot to see if its still there, but if it isn't, then i dont see how it could be a star.

it looked low, but eh, if it was a star, then that's the first star ive seen do that.

ugie,

It might be Mars that you are seeing...

reply to post by rainfall


If it is, then oops!

i am going to check tomorrow, if it isnt there, then im going to be a bit spooked...

What direction was it?

North, South, East, West?

If it was in a south easterly direction, it was probably Venus.

[edit on 10/1/10 by Chadwickus]

reply to post by Chadwickus


it was in the east.

I thought it was a star or something, but i never saw that before. I have been on ATS for a while now, and i am always looking up at night and day to see if i can witness a UFO myself. I have never seen this in the night sky, but i will check tonight to see if i can see this again.

my buddy and i even stopped people on the street to look up, to make sure we werent crazy. they saw it too, and didn't know what it was. i am kind of hoping its venus/mars.... but if not, then this is a can of worms for my own reality to deal with.

Oh if anyone wants, i can upload the rav video files for the video analyzers.

please let me know, and i will do it.

From your descriptions, there is a good chance you were looking at either Rigel, Sirius or Betelgeuse. At that time of the evening they are all low in the sky and would appear to move and alternate colors because of the turbulence and refractive effect of the Earths atmosphere. Definitely take a look again tonight to see if you see the same thing.

Those that think that it is a star or planet forget the many, many lights below. Planets and stars don't shine that bright that you can catch them with a camera among those bright lights around!

Yes. Sirius or Rigel. I went through this same freak out last year and was set straight by our resident expert Phage. See my thread here.

Our Multi Colored Star Is Back

Download a program named Stellarium. It is free. I used it to locate your sighting. If it was SE it was either of the two we mentioned at 7:30 pm. From Jersey City. After opening program use the location tab and time and date tab to roll back to 1/9/10. Hold the mouse button down and spin the screen to desired location.

Sirius also called the Dog Star.

Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky.

Sirius A is about twice as massive as the Sun and has an absolute visual magnitude of 1.42. It is 25 times more luminous than the Sun[8] but has a significantly lower luminosity than other bright stars such as Canopus or Rigel.

Wikipedia

And Yes it is so massive you can even see it through the light pollution of NYC.



[edit on 10-1-2010 by timewalker]

well guys, its about sunset here. its 5PM EST.

I am going to go on a UFO/MARS/VENUS hunt tonight to see if this object appears. I have the camera, and a lot more memory this time. if its there, then its Venus/mars or w/e. if not, then, i am going to be officially SPOOKED!

It's a star, trust me!

reply to post by Mr_skepticc


Ill figure it out tonight. since this was just yesterday, it should show up again right? we have clear skies, so i wont be blocked by cloud cover.

If its there, its there, if not, then well... what WAS it then...

But we, or i wont know until 7-7:30.

Originally posted by Regenstorm
Those that think that it is a star or planet forget the many, many lights below. Planets and stars don't shine that bright that you can catch them with a camera among those bright lights around!

Sirius, Rigel & Betelgeuse might. They are among the brightest objects in the night sky Also of note; when celestial objects are near the horizon they appear larger than they do when they are high in the sky. This effect is most demonstrable with the moon. Whenever you hear someone say "did you see the moon last night? It was huge!" it is a result of this.

It's 7:00 pm in Houston and I can see the Dog Star morphing it's colors in the SE sky. It is freaky the first time you notice it. You will notice that it stops changing colors when it gets higher in the sky. The atmospheric distortions are greater when it is low on the horizon.

Easy answer. It's Sirius, otherwise known as the Dog Star. The brightest star in the entire sky. It's a white main sequence star with a white dwarf companion, about 8 or 9 light years away if i remember right (which is quite close in astronomical terms).

Another little tip to identify between planets and stars is that stars twinkle, planets do not. The twinkling is caused by the atmosphere of the earth refracting it's light (splitting it like a prism) and the turbulence in the air.
Thanks above for pointing out the term scintillation^^

There was a clue in video 1 "I can see Orions belt".

If you draw a line through Orions belt, composed of Alnilam, Alnitak and Mintaka, and follow that line in the downward direction it's pointing, you will come to Sirius. Follow it upwards, you come to a red giant star called Aldebaran (the brightest star in Taurus, which is my constellation).

The reason he couldn't see other stars apart from Sirius and Orions belt? Probably due to light pollution. It's a killer when it comes to the night sky. Here in the UK, astronomers and even regular people have campaigned for different lights to be used, that reduces light pollution. Some have had success, but it's a tough battle.

Astronomy is a fine hobby. I wish i never stopped.

Originally posted by ugie1028
I thought it was a star too, but i lived out here all my life, and i never saw a star do that before in the NYC/NJ area.

Sometimes UFOs turn on a bright light that looks like a scintillating star... kind of. The color will change between red, cyan, and white.

Originally posted by ugie1028
reply to post by Mr_skepticc

 

Ill figure it out tonight. since this was just yesterday, it should show up again right? we have clear skies, so i wont be blocked by cloud cover.

If its there, its there, if not, then well... what WAS it then...

But we, or i wont know until 7-7:30.

G'day ugie

What happened when you went out to have another look?

Kind regards
Maybe...maybe not

Must have been a star/planet then huh?

Oh well...