Italian Astronomers Image UFO On Moon

[Ingo]

http://81.72.14.47/Astro/UFO-April-29-2007/

Pretty crazy, don't know what it is.

[Jarrod]

is there another image some where? my internet is going really slow so im having trouble loading it.

jarrod

[Jarrod]

ah, i got it.

thats bloody creepy! you watch thinking it might be a satellite or something, UNTIL IT TURNS AROUND AND GOES IN ANOTHER DIRECTION!!!!

it seems pretty genuine, but i won't jump to conclusions. it might be a weather balloon or something, although the way it changes direction is interesting. it was definitely in or just above earth's atmosphere.

jarrod.

lol, it was only a week or so ago some one said IIS was due for a UFO report.

[ballaratdragons (Ken)]

Originally Posted by Jarrod

lol, it was only a week or so ago some one said IIS was due for a UFO report.

Me. I was saying that there hasn't been any UFO frenzies for a while.

That one going past the Moon is about 6 months old and didn't cause any ruckus. Interesting to watch though.

[davidpretorius]

very interesting

[Astroman (Andrew Wall)]

for something that is meant to be in space that sure wobbles around alot.

[joe_smith]

People have seen lots more of them. They are also called "Fastwalker's" strange more than one person has imaged them, also Fastwalker is a NORAD term.............

http://www.astrosurf.com/lunascan/konig.htm
http://www.uvouch.com/video-Fastwalk...Shadows-263022 <- Video Link
http://www.astrosurf.com/lunascan/fw-01.htm
http://www.rense.com/general21/nasas.htm

[GrahamL]

I was thinking it was a bug ..and.. wondering why this has a UFO /conspiricy therory attached straight off the bat without the slightest hint of skeptisism or any reasnable attempt to find a more obvious explanation .

[leon]

I wont say what i think, I would be banned from IIS

Leon

[netwolf]

Brings back fond memories of Sunday morning TV back in the 80's in India, Startrek TOS followed by UFO.

Has anyone done the math to workout if possible its location between the telescope and the moon and its size. Could it just be an insect or a bat.

Regards
Fahim

[ballaratdragons (Ken)]

Originally Posted by leon

I wont say what i think, I would be banned from IIS

Leon

[Chrissyo (Chris)]

Originally Posted by nightstalker

I was thinking it was a bug ..and.. wondering why this has a UFO /conspiricy therory attached straight off the bat without the slightest hint of skeptisism or any reasnable attempt to find a more obvious explanation .

It wouldn't be a UFO/conspiracy theory unless they jumped to conclusions. I'm yet to see a single UFO video where the 'believers' haven't jumped to conclusions. The BEST video I've seen has the 'believer' pointing out characteristics of the video and explaining why that COULD be explained by an alien spaceship (and thus their conclusion was that the objects were aliens). That's all well and good, I thought. But they could ALSO be explained much more simply without resorting to fantastical measures backed up by nothing more than conjecture. Another tell-tale sign of a UFO theory is that if nobody can work out what the object is, it's automatically an alien spaceship - NO EXCEPTIONS. Whilst they are certainly a plague to astronomy, I love the UFO 'believers' - they're more entertaining than TV.

As for this video, what is it? Who knows! It is unfocused so as far as it appears, we'll never get a definite answer anyway. Do we need to jump to the "it's an alien spaceship!" conclusion? No. As already mentioned it could be a weather balloon, a bug, a bat, a plane with busted lights, etc. There are 1001 rational possible explanations - so why resort to a stupid irrational explanation.

(Of course, in this post I used the word 'UFO' to mean 'aliens', not its proper term of 'Unidentified Flying Objects'. As far as I can tell, the maker of this video hasn't used the word 'alien' at all, so they probably aren't suggesting it is one).

[joe_smith]

A bug?, isent the secondary mirror and holder a giant size bug but you cant see that in your moon images? I'm not saying its a ship from Venus but if some of the amateur astronomers getting them cant tell what it is or what is causing it, I doubt anyone can. If it is a bug then it should happen more often to people to be common place. Has anyone had something like this happen to them? Also the bug cause has been ruled out by some already. If a beetle crawled on your mirror or even your secondary would it be seen in your webcam video? Also people have images of bats, birds, planes and even the ISS in them but they look nothing like this. What ever it is its very interesting.

Leon or anyone, I would like to know what you think can cause it, after all I guess thats why it was posted anyway. I would like your views on it. Not just on the video file posted but all the other images and video amateur astronomers all over the world are getting of the same thing. These people have big dollar equipment and I guess they know what they are doing well enough to know that they think they have captured something strange. Surely you can do that without being baned, your an amateur astronomer and looked through scopes long enough to add valid input to the thread. How do you think it could happen? explain how you would go about trying to recreate it to see if it has the same effect. I look forward to your ideas

Chrissyo you raise some good points and also point out a common misconception. A UFO is an unidentified flying object. People that say they are alien space craft or flying saucers have identified it thus its no longer unidentified. People think UFO's and alien space craft are the same thing they are not, thats why some people now call it Unidentified aerial phenomena.

I have included some screen captures, one of the object and one with the path it follows. So people who haven't seen the video know what were are talking about.

[citivolus (Ric)]

Given the angular size presented, if it was 100Km from the observer, it would have been under 3m in diameter. The moon was 36 degrees elevation at the time that the imaging started, so an object such as a balloon ~40Km in altitude would have been 70Km away. That gives us an object size of <2m if we assume <40Km altitude.

A bat or bird a few Km away would have the right angular size, and would account for the movement pattern. A balloon at altitude would be less likely to shift direction. An alien spacecraft would probably have somewhere to go and not be wandering back and forth

Alas, it is all just speculation.

[Nevyn]

I believe it could be the moth I let out of my wallet, as the footage seems to coincide with the purchase of my new scope. Has anyone seen a moth suddenly let loose

Serriously, with all the space junk floating around out there it would be hard to assume the blinking lights where anything else!

[manny]

It's one of Lear's moonites looking for a parking spot .Don't you know the moon is crowded.