On the night of the last good aurora i saw a fireball in the sky and so did
a chap in Aviemore - i reported it.

About 30 mins ago, again in the twighlight, i was walking down the garden
looking at the only star that was out, which was very bright and high in the
sky. As i was thinking "is this the Pole star or Mars, no it cant be Mars as
that is reddish" the star wained and went out, leaving a tiny trail?

It did not move up down or sideways it just went out - what was all that
about?

Did anyone else in Scotland see this or am I going mad in my little wooden
office (currently 10 C and outside currently -2 C)?

Please help

brian
aberfeldy

It did not move up down or sideways it just went out - what was all that
about?

Did you make a note of the exact time that your saw it?
It could have been whats called an "Iridium Flare"

An Iridium Flare is a rotating satellite with large solar panels. You may have been at the precise
point and at the precise time when the solar-panels of the satellite are in an orientation where it
reflects the sun's light on your location.

Its just like when you were a child and you used a mirror to reflect the light from the sun to
somebody else's eyes!
Oh No. I NEVER did that ;-)

Visit http://www.heavens-above.com/ and enter you location and see if an iridium flare was visible
at your location and at the time you saw it.


Brendan

I think that that is exactly what I saw - many thanks

brian


"Brendan DJ Murphy" wrote in message
...
It did not move up down or sideways it just went out - what was all that
about?

Did you make a note of the exact time that your saw it?
It could have been whats called an "Iridium Flare"

An Iridium Flare is a rotating satellite with large solar panels. You
may have been at the precise
point and at the precise time when the solar-panels of the satellite are
in an orientation where it
reflects the sun's light on your location.

Its just like when you were a child and you used a mirror to reflect the
light from the sun to
somebody else's eyes!
Oh No. I NEVER did that ;-)

Visit http://www.heavens-above.com/ and enter you location and see if an
iridium flare was visible
at your location and at the time you saw it.


Brendan

Did you make a note of the exact time that your saw it?
It could have been whats called an "Iridium Flare"

You can set your watch by them. I checked one tonight at 1724:59 GMT on the
dot as predicted.

Jack

You can set your watch by them. I checked one tonight at 1724:59 GMT on the
dot as predicted.

That "Heavens Above" website is amazing! I often use it to see when the International Space Station
is passing overhead.
It can be as bright as the planet Venus!

Brendan

On Sun, 7 Dec 2003 17:36:17 -0000, Brendan DJ Murphy wrote:

Did you make a note of the exact time that your saw it?
It could have been whats called an "Iridium Flare"

An Iridium Flare is a rotating satellite with large solar panels.

I didn't think Iridium sats rotated well not like some do but
maintained a fixed attitude relative to the ground and it was this
that enabled the prediction of the "flares" to be very accurate.

An iridium flare doesn't last long maybe 5 or 10s at most and aren't
that long in the sky, two or three fingers width at arms length. I'd
expect a fireball to be have amuch longer track length.

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

"Dave Liquorice" wrote

An Iridium Flare is a rotating satellite with large solar panels.

I didn't think Iridium sats rotated well not like some do but
maintained a fixed attitude relative to the ground and it was this
that enabled the prediction of the "flares" to be very accurate.

The DO rotate - about once every 1 hr 42 mins (= one orbit round earth)

Didn't I enjoy being such a pedant!

Jack

Yn erthygl , sgrifennodd
Brendan DJ Murphy :
Visit http://www.heavens-above.com/ and enter you location and see if an iridium flare was visible
at your location and at the time you saw it.

Fantastic! I just saw my first iridium flare. Put in my data to this
site and it told me there was one within an hour at mag. -7.0.
With clear skies, at 17:28:22 last night, sure enough, there it was.

Amazing. Thanks for alerting me to this site.

Adrian

--
Adrian Shaw ais@
Adran Cyfrifiadureg, Prifysgol Cymru, aber.
Aberystwyth, Ceredigion, Cymru ac.
http://users.aber.ac.uk/ais uk