Super Fast Object Seen, Possibly Satellite, Angular Velocity 4.5 degrees per Sec, Insane

Hi. I'm posting a new thread here because I saw a very fast moving 'satellite' last night at 23.03 BST in the UK. I even managed to take a photograph of it with my LG G6 phone and I will endeavor to post it here if there is some way of getting around the Adblock software.

My wife and I both saw it and I only had just enough time to unlock my phone, open the camera, move the cover and shoot it - now bear in mind I'm holding the camera in my hand, no tripod and it's low light, taking a picture of a point of light in the sky in HDR mode. Note camera details:

Focal length 4.1mm
Aperture 1.8
Exposure 1/5
ISO 2750

Magnitude-wise, it was about half of the ISS - so nice and visible but un-exceptional. I'm amazed my phone got it. Anyway, I got a view of it while it was reasonably high in the sky - about 80 degrees elevation, travelling from North to South, I took the shot as quick as I could because it was literally about to go to the horizon in SECONDS!!

The photo I'm trying to post shows Jupiter peaking through the tree tops - which is almost exactly 25 degrees elevation and south south west. The photo shows just how much the object moves in 1/5th of a second! It's mental fast. To see the object, you'll need to be using a monitor and zoom in.

Due to the nature of this post, obviously there are no links or videos. I'm hoping someone here might have a clue what it might be. Now I looked around the internet to see if anyone else had seen something similar. A chap saw something fast moving like this in Italy in 2011 and after some sleuthing arrived at the conclusion it was a spent rocket booster from an APT-12 satellite. It had an angular velocity of 1.66 degrees/sec.

What I saw would have been more like 4.5 degrees/sec. It was insanely quick. Needless to say, I checked ISS, Heavens Above and 'other' sources - but NADA. So, I've resorted to making a new thread. I apologize in advance for it being a bit minimal, possibly self indulgent - I just wanna' know!!!!

Pic to follow shortly...

Is it the white dot partially obscured by the foliage on the tree? Actually I think I see it left of center horizontally pretty much center vertically?

kudos for trying with the pic, but it's not showing much.
I saw a pair of them once, super fast, like shooting star fast, but they stopped and one zig zagged and shot away. Very cool to see.

originally posted by: BigDave-AR
Is it the white dot partially obscured by the foliage on the tree? Actually I think I see it left of center horizontally pretty much center vertically?

You're bang on. Conveniently, the white dot in the tree tops is Jupiter. Just left of centre is the object, that looks like a vertical streak. The streak is mostly caused by it transiting that distance in 1/5th of a second!! I had to be quick.

I'm not saying the picture is great, but I have a very steady hand - you can clearly see the vertical movement, there is no blurring of the silhouetted trees, so I did a decent job of keeping still while I took the shot - the vertical streak is from the object rapidly heading towards the southern horizon (well, tree tops at any rate!).

originally posted by: network dude
kudos for trying with the pic, but it's not showing much.
I saw a pair of them once, super fast, like shooting star fast, but they stopped and one zig zagged and shot away. Very cool to see.

That's crazy! The picture isn't uber exciting, granted, but if you look just left of centre, you can see the vertical streak of light. That's the object. There is likely a way of calculating from the FOV, focal length, the number of pixels of the streak, the shutter speed etc how many arc seconds the object travelled during the exposure. From that, one could do a pretty good job of calculating the angular velocity of said 'satellite' and see if it matches up with anything.

So far, I'm at a loss.

With the right software, I guess I could count the pixels of the vertical streak - but there's no way people dropping in on this thread using a mobile would even be able to see the dot in my photo, much less deduce what it might be.

Just for information, the picture was taken in West Wales, UK.

I thought I saw it, but then I scrolled and realized it was a speck of dust on my monitor.

I can't EVEN see it (on my laptop).

Might be good if you could post a link to the picture itself so we could zoom in on it.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
I thought I saw it, but then I scrolled and realized it was a speck of dust on my monitor.

I can't EVEN see it (on my laptop).

Might be good if you could post a link to the picture itself so we could zoom in on it.

Crikey - it ain't that small!! LOL

I have downloaded the one I upped to ATS and whilst not fabulous, it's quite clear to see the streak. Remember - this is a point of light traveling at 4.5 degrees/sec. It isn't going to jump up and slap you in the face, even at 13 mega pixels.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
I thought I saw it, but then I scrolled and realized it was a speck of dust on my monitor.

I can't EVEN see it (on my laptop).

Might be good if you could post a link to the picture itself so we could zoom in on it.

It took work but I found it on my phone, I’m about to jump into my “study” and take a better peek with my 27” 1440p monitor and see if I can’t make out slightly more.

a reply to: horatio321

Hi. I'm posting a new thread here because I saw a very fast moving 'satellite' last night at 23.03 BST

Hmmm. I was outside 11 pm ish EST last night. Saw similar. I was outside trying to figure out what was going on up the street- gunshots or fireworks. Looked straight up at the tv transmitting antenna, and saw this speck of light going across the sky NE/ SW. I'd say it was twice the size of this period-> .
For me, unless it's close enough to see the color of the hull, or someone waving at me from a window, I usually don't bother with ambiguous lights.

For those who are struggling to see it:

originally posted by: wylekat
a reply to: horatio321

Hi. I'm posting a new thread here because I saw a very fast moving 'satellite' last night at 23.03 BST

Hmmm. I was outside 11 pm ish EST last night. Saw similar. I was outside trying to figure out what was going on up the street- gunshots or fireworks. Looked straight up at the tv transmitting antenna, and saw this speck of light going across the sky NE/ SW. I'd say it was twice the size of this period-> .
For me, unless it's close enough to see the color of the hull, or someone waving at me from a window, I usually don't bother with ambiguous lights.

Thanks for the heads-up. I guess we all see satellites - It wasn't doing anything other than travelling exceptionally fast. it was insane. Thus the post.

I mean I've been here for years and never upped a picture. I even resorted to using Explorer to get the job done. That's how keen I was to up this thread. I # you not!

originally posted by: BigDave-AR

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
I thought I saw it, but then I scrolled and realized it was a speck of dust on my monitor.

I can't EVEN see it (on my laptop).

Might be good if you could post a link to the picture itself so we could zoom in on it.

It took work but I found it on my phone, I’m about to jump into my “study” and take a better peek with my 27” 1440p monitor and see if I can’t make out slightly more.

Thank you. Here's to hoping!

Hoping this is better....

originally posted by: horatio321
Hoping this is better....

Getting better...

originally posted by: horatio321

originally posted by: wylekat
a reply to: horatio321

Hi. I'm posting a new thread here because I saw a very fast moving 'satellite' last night at 23.03 BST

Hmmm. I was outside 11 pm ish EST last night. Saw similar. I was outside trying to figure out what was going on up the street- gunshots or fireworks. Looked straight up at the tv transmitting antenna, and saw this speck of light going across the sky NE/ SW. I'd say it was twice the size of this period-> .
For me, unless it's close enough to see the color of the hull, or someone waving at me from a window, I usually don't bother with ambiguous lights.

Thanks for the heads-up. I guess we all see satellites - It wasn't doing anything other than travelling exceptionally fast. it was insane. Thus the post.

I mean I've been here for years and never upped a picture. I even resorted to using Explorer to get the job done. That's how keen I was to up this thread. I # you not!

What I saw was doing a pretty fair clip across the sky as well, and I lost it before it ever got to the horizon, either clouds or I just simply lost it. My shot at getting a pic of it was so bad, you couldn't see anything. Not even the tower. I was playing with my phone (had to have something to do while trying to play "guess the loud noise"), and finding out it can do nearly daylight shots in the dark. IF it's on a tripod. AND you have a remote shutter button. And, you aren't prone to sneezing while trying to hold the stupid thing in your hand.

a reply to: wylekat

LOL! Yeah, it's not easy taking pictures at night when you're actually holding the camera. Let alone when the subject you're trying to capture is a tiny pin point of light. It's much, much harder than people think.

Thankfully, it's rapid angular velocity is what shows it up in the pic I took - it looks like a vertical streak at first glance. On the 3120 x 4160 shot that I'm looking at (I'm hoping it's what you guys are getting now) you can see 3 distinct clusters of pixels where the object transited during the exposure - the shutter was 1/5th of a second.

A quick estimate of angular velocity was based on the fact that I saw it from almost directly overhead (90degrees) to below the trees in under 15 seconds. To horizon, it would have been about 20 seconds all told.

I'm still at a loss.

If someone had told me that a rocket booster was about to burn up, it would have made sense. But the truth is, nothing of that nature was documented.

My missus just thinks 'very fast satellite'. She doesn't care much for Heavens Above, Stellarium or Tin Foil hats and thinks I'm being a massive geek. LOL.

I used to work for the MOD. It was definitely something interesting - possibly a very fast military satellite, space craft or hyper-sonic aircraft at very high altitude. Whatever it was, they ain't advertising it......

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
I thought I saw it, but then I scrolled and realized it was a speck of dust on my monitor.

I can't EVEN see it (on my laptop).

Might be good if you could post a link to the picture itself so we could zoom in on it.

OK, for some reason the 13mp photo I upped was radically reduced in size, so I've re-uploaded it. This should be better - 3120 x 4160. Please try that.

I haven't hosted the picture anywhere, so I can't link to it unfortunately.

a reply to: horatio321

There currently aren't any hypersonic aircraft flying, and the only spacecraft in orbit that we have is the X-37B.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Cheers. No SCRAMJET testing at the moment then? Hmmm.

So if supposing we could get a glimpse of light reflecting of the X 37B, do you have an idea of how quick it would get from horizon to horizon?

They only thing I've seen in my experience that could move as quick as that light in the sky last night was a 'missile'. Even the Meteorite I witnessed coming in over the UK in Sep 2012 moved slower than what I saw last night, to get some sort of perspective on it.

a reply to: horatio321

It would look like a satellite going over. About as bright as one too. What color was the light? White? Or a different color?