Was it a satellite? Plane?

[chrissara]

Briefly for about 10 minutes last night at around 8:45pm to 9:00pm in Mackay, I oberved what I initially thought was a satellite.

After a closer view, it appeared that the object had a flashing light (it was too high up to observe the colour of the flashing). I knew then it was not a satellite.

The problem was I could judge from the distance of the object in the sky that it was not a commercial plane. In other words, the height would have been at a low satellite height (or just slightly lower).

The reason I say it wasn't a commercial plane was that it moved slowly across the sky but changed path regularly. It was directly above me NNE to N at 65 to 80 degrees (more above Arcturus).

It certainly was not a private plane.

It moved from say NNE or NE at around 50 to 60 degrees, to North at about 80 degrees, dropped down from North 80 degrees to 55 to 60 degrees, before then heading back in a NNE / NE direction at around 60 to 70 degrees.

I then lost sight of it as it stopped blinking/flashing. I would guesstimate it was observable for a good 5-6 minutes.

Although unlikely, could it have been a Military based object (e.g. high plane, low earth satellite?) Any other ideas?

[vespine]

if you live anywhere even near an airport, in the vicinity of most capital cities you are probably used to seing planes already on their approach run. Planes start to desend (or haven't made it to their cruising altitude) for several hundred kilometers away from the airports. You get used to seeing planes flying relatively low.

An average cruising altitude for a jet liner is about 35000ft in the old scale, or roughly 12000 meters, 12km! That's pretty high. In Europe, where there are a LOT of flights traveling overhead it is a lot more common then Melbourne where almost all of the flights anywhere near there ARE either coming or going from the airport.

[smenkhare]

Some private jets can fly up to 20,000ft higher than commercial airliners.

[chrissara]

Thanks for the replies.

I suppose what put me off was that the airplane (if it was that) was very very high (estiimate low satellite orbit). It changed direction like this:


I-----

[CoombellKid]

I'm on the north coast of NSW, we often have the RAAF roaring over head
at under 200 feet, basicly skimming the tree tops. One flew over the other
day that was so low I could make out the googles on the guy flying it. Other
time they come over so fast you only hear them leaving and it is
masively loud!!!! scares the living be-jesus outa ya! however they all from
time to time come along and suddenly scream skyward until they out of
sight. I have also notice they do manuvour at high altitude usually in pairs.
And appear way higher then commerical jets, Maybe you saw a RAAF pilot
on a training flight.

However I have no idea where you are locate, so who knows

regards,CS

Rob

[asimov]

Pretty hard to judge the altitude of objects at night sometimes.

Satellites don't change path, so thats out. I'd suggest it was as Rob says.

[fringe_dweller]

:eyepop: man that is low!! have they glass bottoms now? :D

[chrissara]

Sorry my last post was incomplete. The path it followed was like this:

(-----
( ---
( -------------
(
(-----
------
-------------


So in other words it headed back from the same direction it came from, but the light disappeared well, well before the horizon at about 55 degrees in the sky. That is why I ruled out a commercial flight, unless the pilot suddenly did a 180 for some unknown reason.

Also the turning part was slow.

It is possible it was an amateur pilot or private, but I question why they would do such a manoveur and why their lights would suddenly disappear.

Too high for a helicopter (and I suggest private plane).

Leaves military I suppose, but the lights turning off or disappearing is the bit that got me.

NB This isn't a UFO thread!!!

[Astroman]

Must be a UFO

It was unidentified, it was flying and it was an object of some sort.

A UFO doesnt always mean little grey men from Zeta Reticuli 2 - 4...

[Gargoyle_Steve]

Who told you about Zeta Reticuli?????


:ship1: