| FLASHES from the sky | man-made intruder in the sky... |
December 15 2005 (ETS-6 - 'KiKu (chrysanthemu) ' a box-shaped sat with x2 solar panel 'petals' )- A series of regular spaced video triggered recording by UFOCapture lead me to investigate further . Single AVI play back revealed x1 flash. Browsing the series of bmps revealed the spot appear to be very slow moving ... It was already well past 11:00pm and I have a flashing satellite in FOV!
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| Peak-hold image from a longer 1 1/2 min AVI produced the star-trails and x1 flash position. The sat hardly move in during this 'exposure'. Half an hour later ETS 6 had moved further up towards the 'square' asterism. |
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| Thanks to Ed Cannon - the ID turned out to be ETS-6 (94-056A, 23230). Skymap plot below showed the correct ID to be ETS-6 using two images above & the magnitude 3+ and nine seconds flash timing ( I timed x10 cycles of the flashing sat and obtained average of 9.025 sec.) Video (<700Kb) of a single flash giving you an idea what to expect. |
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| December 11 2005 : Two Centaurs were caught flaring while I was watching the video with FOV centered on the diamond shaped Constellation of Phoenix one of the Southern birds. I only noticed the flare on 92-013B (Atlas 1C) and was trying to re-center on subsequent frames to capture at least two flares not knowing 80-098B(Atlas Centaur R) made the appearance first. Note the maxima in both images... the video avi was huge 500mb... ( Timing 80-098B : 4.609+13.335 sec, 92-013B 18.916 sec * taken from another video frame that captured two consecutive flares. ) |
| (updated Jan 01 2006) - I reran the 500 Mb raw AVI file through Limovie - a software that output selected object intensity vs frame rate. Since I was not tracking 92--013B and it moved during the flash from position 1 to 2, I selected the Meteor mask instead of star. ( See insert in the graph). The resultant csv files with intensity measurement vs frame# was plotted in spreadsheet. A section was inserted in the image below. From the frame#, duration can be easily derived ( Pal- 25 frame per Second) |
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| OCT 21 2005 - Atlas 3B Centaur 03-57B flashes pass the 'handle' of Teapot. Note the presence /absence of terminating maxima . ( insert is the Skymap plot ID this object) |
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| Oct 1 2005 Atlas Centaur R #76-073B left a 'meteor-like' short stubby image. 'V' 'v' denote the maxima seen in this short 2.0- second+ flare up. Watch the 1.7Mb wmv full screen. |
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| Sep 30 2005 - DMSP B5D2-6 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) 91-082A produced a bright x1 'prolong' flash ( two close flashes) at bottom edge. Watch it in this <1 mb WMV file |
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| Sep 28 2005 A flashing ' satellite' near Lepus. What appeared like a track left by a passing airplane turned out to be a flashing Atlas Centaur R/B 72-003B. Note the sharp flashes created a 'barb'-wire appearance in this image. |
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| Sep 25 '05 - ISS ploughed through the sky and created this !! - it was much brighter than what I expected a wopping ~ minus 3.7 mag. |
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| Sep 23 05 7:56pm - Atlas Centaur R #81-119B entered FOV with a triple increasing magnitude flashes (position 1) and a mid-frame single flash before exiting on bottom left. The 3rd flash(es) unfortunately was obscured by the time stamp. Time taken from 1st to 2nd flash is 9.453 sec (based on time stamp differences). The beginning 3 quick flashes: 2nd one 0.281 sec, 3rd 0.328 sec |
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| Sep 03 '05 - EGP( Experimental Geodetic Payload (Japanese satellite)) - DISCO BALL IN THE SKY. A splendid fast flasher- EGP was on time and left a complex flash- 'finger-print' in this peak hold image with a f1.3 50mm lens. Thin cloud had diffused the flash somewhat. Prelim frame analysis have not indicated any regular repeated patterns. A partial sequence of flash-to-flash duration in term of frame no 1 f=0.04 sec (4-3-11-1-5-11-12-1-8-4-10-6-9-26*-9-1-14-25*-10-14). |
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| Aug 26 2005. Bright flashes from satellite While monitoring for meteors I noticed the static frames registered a bright circular 'intruder' near Antares. A total of x2 static frames were found. AVIs played back indicated a bright flashing sat with long period between flashes. Co-add of the two bitmaps was reproduced below. Using Rob's skymap the intruder was ID to be 94-68A or IRS ( Indian Remote Sensing Satellite) P2 cat# 23323. Watch the video of the brighter single flash ( pos 2 in fig below). |
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| AUG 26 6:15 AM sky
THESE
ARE NOT METEORS but a flaring sat! Here is a composite of three still frames. They look like small meteor even on avi play back. But no way three meteors will line up so perfectly with similar trail length and equal brightness. |
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| Quick check : frame #1 06:15:28.718 sec, #2 06:15:37.046, #3 06:15:45.734 giving (#2-#1)=8.328 sec, and (#3-#2)=8.688 sec. Single Flash duration ( dim-peak-dim) using one set of data is ~ 2.281 sec |
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