Unknown Satellite Crossing The Sun

jaws1975
reply to post by intrptr

 

The telescope is zoomed in observing sun spots, don't you think that a satellite orbiting earth would be much much bigger if it was to transit across the telescopes line of sight?

No.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

DenyObfuscation
reply to post by tsingtao

 

it has to be big to see it against the sun.

I'm not so sure about that

the view in the op is a million times closer note the detail on the surface of the sun. your comparison is apples to oranges. not even close.

Alda1981
since none said it... ummm MERCURY??

uh notice the long boom/appendage sticking out the ten/eleven o'clock position of the main circle with the dot on the end of it. Compared to the size of those sunspots (which we are zoomed in on), it nullifies any claim that the object is small. If anyone can't figure that out it's their problem.

reply to post by intrptr


What the above poster said.

skyblueworld

Details:

While imaging sunspots we observed a fast-moving satellite with a long boom arm crossing the field of view. This sequence spans 36 milliseconds of real time. The object was moving East at 1 degree per second. Lunt LS100 solar telescope.

Link to source on spaceweather.com

I have no idea whether this is a satellite or not, but it is quite interesting. I ran some numbers to see if this could even possibly be a manmade object... and the numbers are pretty interesting.

Disclaimer: There are a lot of "if's" in this post, not the least of which is the assumption that this might be some sort of artificial spacecraft or satellite (manmade or otherwise) and not something else. I think my math is right, but I'm sure others will correct me if I calculated something wrong.

The observatory said it was "Moving east at 1 degree per second." Anyone know what this means for sure? I could think of 2 possible meanings: relative to the sun or relative to the earth.

1. Relative to the sun

It's probably NOT relative to the sun, as the speed required would be fairly mind boggling though still possible according to Einstein (but not with known current technology on earth). Let's run some numbers. Let's suppose they meant that it was a satellite that circled the sun (360 degrees) in 360 seconds (6 minutes).

Minimum distance from the sun would be a factor. NASA is currently planning Solar Probe Plus to launch in 2015. It will orbit the sun at a distance of 8.5 solar radii from the surface of the sun (i.e., 9.5 solar radii from the center). This is apparently the limits of what is currently feasible with our technology because of the heat.

The solar radius is approximately 432,450 miles. Take that times 9.5 times 2 times pi to get the circumference and then divide by 360 seconds. It would have to travel approximately 71,700 miles per second. That's 38.5% of the speed of light.

OK, so that's probably not what they meant when they said 1 degree per second, so...

2. Relative to the earth

Relative to the earth is more likely to be what they meant. So does 1 degree per second mean that if it is a satellite in earth orbit and that it would circle the earth in 360 seconds? 6 minutes?

If so, that's still pretty fast! As with the previous example, the speed would depend on distance out. The fastest satellites are in low earth orbit. According to SOURCE: telescope.org:

Low Earth Orbits Satellites... [orbit at] 160 km [~100 miles] above the Earth... orbit the earth very quickly, one complete orbit normally taking 90 minutes.

So that would mean that if this is a satellite orbiting the earth then it is traveling at least 15 times as fast as our fastest satellites in earth orbit normally travel. If it it further out than a low earth orbit satellite, then it is traveling even faster.

How fast is this? The radius of the earth is approximately 3,959 miles. Add 100 miles and take that times 2 times pi to get the circumference and then divide by 360 seconds. It would have to travel approximately 70.84 miles per second, more than 255,000 miles per hour.

So what is the fastest manmade spacecraft known? It's apparently the Juno spacecraft. Juno slingshotted around the earth to do a gravity boost on its way to Jupiter in October 2013:

... the team turned to the slingshot technique, where Earth's gravity gives the spacecraft a key speed boost.

"Juno will be really smoking as it passes Earth at a speed of about 25 miles per second relative to the Sun," said Kurth...

By harnessing the Earth's gravity, Juno will exceed the 165,000 mph it needs to reach Jupiter.

SOURCE: Fox News

Using that 165,000 mph figure for Juno, that means if this is a satellite orbiting the earth then it is traveling at least 1.5 times faster than the fastest publicly known manmade craft.

Very interesting!

amurphy245
reply to post by intrptr

 

Interesting theory ,my first thought was asteroid but then I saw the "boom" ,we will likely never know what it was

Also why is it that with nearly every thread on ats half the posts are people trying to be funny cracking lame jokes and posting silly pictures?

Everyone has access and everyone has something to say.

but really how can we tell if it was huge ? i mean we don't know for sure how far is it but really interesting

it can't be something in our skies flying in front of a telescope because it is zoomed into a small area on the sun and considering the relative distance the object would be too out of focus If not covering the entire frame. I would like to see more of this footage and have questions such as before it appears and after the footage stops, why so abrupt? Can we track this thing? Find it again?

reply to post by skyblueworld


There is some kind of "ray" from the object.... Is visible a tiny shadow...

bottleslingguy

Alda1981
since none said it... ummm MERCURY??

uh notice the long boom/appendage sticking out the ten/eleven o'clock position of the main circle with the dot on the end of it. Compared to the size of those sunspots (which we are zoomed in on), it nullifies any claim that the object is small. If anyone can't figure that out it's their problem.

The plane was also large compared to the sunspots.

What you see is a satellite imaging the area around the sun, the little dot at the end of the boom is there to block the sun from the camera view so it can get a better picture of what is ejected from the sun etc...

reply to post by skyblueworld


It looks like it's appearing from nowhere as if it's coming out of the sun.. weird.

bottleslingguy

DenyObfuscation
reply to post by tsingtao

 

it has to be big to see it against the sun.

I'm not so sure about that

the view in the op is a million times closer note the detail on the surface of the sun. your comparison is apples to oranges. not even close.

Beyond a certain distance all objects in the field of view are in focus. The higher the "magnification" the larger the objects appear against the background. On the highest mag even a satellite would appear "apples and oranges". 1:20 into here…

reply to post by TrueBrit


It's true the passage of the satellite is about all that would be available to film without following, what I don't get is that the rest of the Gif, (the background if you like) is already running. He may have layered the satellite image in with the background sun, just for scale, or whatever.

He does say the satellite moved 1 degree per second, and he must have been using high speed film of some kind for the job he was doing, its too short for all that frame movement in say, usual video, and that too may have been the reason for the sudden appearance. I don't know about that though.

NewAgeMan
reply to post by skyblueworld

 

It looks like it's appearing from nowhere as if it's coming out of the sun.. weird.

They started the recording when it was in front of the sun. It then drifts out of view... What you experience as it "coming out of the sun" is just the replay of the GIF animation making you confused about the timing.

spacedoubt
It's also worth noting that a lot of Sats. use what is called a gravity gradient boom, for Attitude control.
Putting a mass out on a boom like that can help with orientation.

Here are a bunch of images of what that can look like.
Gravity Gradient Boom

It's a very common technique.

Thats probably what the boom is for. Whats the package at the end? On Voyager the boom was used as a platform for twin low field magnetometers…

blogs.nature.com...

reply to post by skyblueworld


Why does this seem to just appear out of nowhere? There isn't a point where it comes into frame or anything it literally just appears and leaves the screen. I am confused can somebody explain this to me better or help me understand completely?


NEVER MIND I found a reply I was looking for sorry

reply to post by intrptr


Sometimes the weight is just a passive mass. With no instrumentation. It can be extended and retracted to achieve different amounts of attitude control. It dampens wobbles, for example. Or if there is a small burn to reposition the bird, they might extend it further temporarily to get rid of any oscillating, or ringing effect caused by the burn.

But, as in a lot of Sats..They like to pack as much as possible, so an instrument can also serve as the counterweight.

Believe it or not, I actually used to command some birds to do just this thing, in one of my previous jobs..

intrptr


Thats probably what the boom is for. Whats the package at the end? On Voyager the boom was used as a platform for twin low field magnetometers…

If say, it was FAlconsat 3 The 'Bar' as I called it in an earlier post, (the package at the end of the boom), is a battery. FAlconsat 5 there is not much info on, and nobody is talking. Both are USAF LEO projects.

Thing is, if that is a satellite, which is what I think it is, it needs to be much closer to home, if it was near the Sun in any way, you are talking about something nearer planet sized.

tsingtao

how close to the sun is it?

About 93 million miles away from the Sun. It's a satelite. Orbiting Earth. Haven't you been following the thread?

NewAgeMan
reply to post by skyblueworld

 

It looks like it's appearing from nowhere as if it's coming out of the sun.. weird.

No it's doesn't. Why do people keep saying it does? The first frame in this GIF animation is when the satellite was already in the view of the telecope, and you see how it goes out of view. The "coming into view" wasn't filmed. I could make a GIF like that, but with a car driving past a forest... Would you then say that the car looks like it just popped out of the forest? Of course not! Use common sense.

ParanormalGuy

NewAgeMan
reply to post by skyblueworld

 

It looks like it's appearing from nowhere as if it's coming out of the sun.. weird.

They started the recording when it was in front of the sun. It then drifts out of view... What you experience as it "coming out of the sun" is just the replay of the GIF animation making you confused about the timing.

Gotcha. Thanks. That's what I figured. And with all the satellites out there, it's no wonder the field of view would have them crossing it from time to time. Case solved.