Strange Moving Star

[leon]

Hi All,

Last night i did some imaging and ended up with some nice images of the LMC.

However, I new that 40sec's images of LMC would not reveal much, but wanted to see how 135mm F2.0 would go at that short exposure, i was right,not real good.

Anyway I decided to look through the images last night, just to see what was captured at that speed, and as I scrolled through each image I noticed this star, or point of light the size of a Star move through each image, from the top of LMC to the Bottom.

It is only one light source, everything else is stationary, its not a sattelite, or Meteor, or the ISP, so what is it, they would trail.

I will attach all the images, so if some one can copy the eight of them in order, and have a look you will see this thing move.

Cheers leon, very interesting....

[[1ponders]]

Don't know Leon. Only thing I can think of is a satellite, but you're right about there should be trailing at that length of exposure. At that focal length you could probably only expect 10 sec or so of exposure before trailing. Can you post a full frame crop from one of the images, centered on the object?

[leon]

Hi Paul,
I'll try but it may come out pretty small

Leon

Ah That's ok, there seems to be movement, what ever it is

[Astroman]

Might be worth contacting CBAT or someone like that, with the times and exposure times etc... you may have found a Near earth asteroid that has gone undetected.

[leon]

Andrew and Paul, the thing is obviously moving but slowly, because as i recall, when i do imaging i always bracket my exposures with a 30second gap before the next exposure.

So I's like this, 40sec's exp, than 30 sec gap, than 40sec exp, that explains its different positions with each frame, but why is it moving, that is what i would like to know.
And also the larger gap in the middle of the eight frames is because i lost that frame to a remote switch malfunction, other wise the gaps would have been equal.

Cheers leon

[leon]

Andrew i dont know how to contact anyone in regard to this.

Cheers Leon

[JohnG]

What time were the images taken, there was an Iridium satelite that went thought that area and flared overhead just after 2200 last night.

Cheers

JohnG

[leon]

John at about Midnight, but if it was a flare it would be only on one frame, and it would be a streak of light.
I took 10, 40sec's expo's of the same area, but lost two due to remote switch failure.
Cheers leon

[[1ponders]]

Whoops! I just realized something. IF the satellite is geostationary or in a polar orbit (which your's probably is) then you won't get normal star trails. :doh: If polar then the trails will be N/S, not E/W as is normal, and the degree of trailing will depend on the satellites angular velocity in relation to the viewing point (your camera)

[leon]

Gee Paul, did you have to ruin the suspense, :lol: i thought i had discovered something real. :whistle:

Cheers leon :thumbsup:

Now do you want to explain that in English, :screwy: Na, I get the meaning.

[JohnG]

No worries Leon, the actual flare occured well North of where you were imaging, your time eliminated that anyway, I agree with Paul, probably a geostationary satellite.

Back to the cricket. :)

Cheers

JohnG

[dcnicholls]

Defintely not a geostationary satellite! They're usually close to the celestial equator for obvious reasons. Looks more like a slow polar orbiting satellite

DN

[dcnicholls]

I ran Starry Night for Ballarat and an hour either side of midnight, last night. It reproduces many (but not all) satellites, but none fitted the images. However, given the LMC's position in the sky, it wasn't a polar orbiting satellite as the path tracked from west to east.

If the exposures were 40 seconds duration and 30 seconds between images, it appears the object was emitting flashes (ie rotating and reflecting sunlight) for just a short period during each exposure (suggested by Dave Herald).

Curious.

DN

[leon]

Well it is certainly interesting alright, but i'm sure it is explainable, ah well, something different to talk about.

Cheers Leon

[Astroman]

could be a spent rocket stage floating around up there....

[astroron]

What is the blue fuzzy object to the left of centre?

[leon]

Have no idea astroron

Cheers Leon

[dcnicholls]

Tarantula Nebula with the blues? ;)

DN

[ferozious]

Nah, it's the mothership from which Leon's UFO originated :ship2:
;)

[ballaratdragons]

It is a bit faster than your real time sighting, Leon, but here is an animation of your object :thumbsup:

[ballaratdragons]

Ahhhh, here ya go, one second intervals between frames.

[leon]

THat's pretty clever Ken, so what is it mate.

Cheers leon

[ballaratdragons]

Leon, according to the apparent magnitude variation rising and falling twice in it's short capture of travel, I'd say (at a rough guess) it is a piece of tumbling space junk.

There is an awful lot of it up there.

[leon]

Yea Ken, you are probably right mate, shame it's not something more worthy.

Cheers leon

[C.]

Just a thought. I notice you were imaging on January 11th which was the same date the Chinese knocked out their satellite.

[ballaratdragons]

Ahhhhh! The plot thickens!

[mojo]

Now wouldn't that be a catch!

[ballaratdragons]

OK, call me wierd, but watch the video very carefully and tell me if the object isn't travelling in a straight line!

It appears to me to start on a trajectory to the bottom of screen, then very very slightly change direction to move to the right a bit, then back on it's original course!!!

The variation is only slight and hard to see, but I see it.

[mojo]

shhh. You'll get Leon into trouble. It's just a weather balloon.

[ballaratdragons]

:lol:

But it does appear to change direction!

Like this:

[firstlight]

Its amazing how the eye can deceive you. I just layered each image in photoshop, semi transparent each, inverted and line tooled from first to the last.... fraid to say totally straight. I off set the line turned each layer on and off in succession and dead straight.

I could be an old geostationary sat fallen out of orbit, I've seen slow tumbling ones before. Has to be high to catch the sun that late, I suppose.

Cheers
Tony

[firstlight]

Still could be an neo