UK UFO sighting. Wiltshire 6th August 2007 11PM

Hi all,
I’ve put a few posts on here before but on the 6th of August I saw my first UFO. I wanted to explain a little about myself. Explain what I saw and ask a few questions for those in the know.

About Me:
I have been a long time “fan/researcher” of UFOs ever since I saw Flight of the Navigator when I was about 5 years old I have been fascinated ever since. I am pretty familiar with most of the major cases in Ufology and read ATS on a daily basis. I don’t post much as I have never had much relevant to say, I also find some responses quite rude and intimidating. I have followed things like the Chad/Raj/Issac drones with great interest.

I work as a Trainer for a medical software company and my job involves travelling all over the UK and Ireland on a regular basis.

Here is my story:
As some of you may know smoking is banned in public places in the UK so after a hard day at work I was at the pub next to the hotel. I went out for a cigarette (after 1 pint I might add so I wasn’t drunk). I went out and it was a perfectly clear night. I started scanning the sky and saw a bright white light which was no brighter than say the pole star. As I watched it started rising in the sky. I watched it as it moved very quickly overhead in a straight line. I rushed into the pub and asked my college to come out and have a look so that I knew I wasn’t going nuts. We both observed the object for another 30-45 seconds and it moved in the same straight line across the sky.

Then all of a sudden to the left of the object there was a small flash and the UFO gradually faded away to nothing.

Here are some facts:
I observed the UFO for about 1 and a half minutes to 2 minutes in total before it disappeared.

In that time it had almost covered the entire range of the visible night sky horizon to horizon (if that makes sense) from West to East. It essentially “Rose in the west and set in the east”.

I have seen aircraft in the night sky most nights as my house in Kent in on most major airline routes out of London heading south. This object did not have red or green flashing lights, nor did it have a white flashing strobe light.

I estimated the UFO’s altitude to be very high obviously I cannot prove this just how it felt while observing it.

I have observed shooting stars before this was NOT a shooting star.

It did not break up there was a small flash next to the object and it faded away.

Some questions for you guys to rule things out that came into my mind:
How long does the ISS take to cross the night sky(horizon to horizon)?
Would a shuttle launch be visible from the UK?
Were there any rocket/satellite launches on the 6th August 2007 at around 11pm BST (British summer time)?

If any of you guys have any questions for me, or need some more details then I am more than happy to answer. I don’t necessarily believe it was “alien” I just want to rule out any satellite/rocket launch possibilities.

Thanks for your time.

it could be an irridium flare..although I dont think they would last for 2 mins..the flash/fading out part seems odd. If its a meteor it would have cross the sky alot quicker (?)
I guess the fact it did'nt make any weird manouvers lands it in the realm of something like that though

[edit on 7-8-2007 by wildone106]

Nice post mate but unfortunately without some sort of photographic proof you will probably find it hard to be taken seriously or generate any interest in the UFO forum.

If its a meteor it would have cross the sky alot quicker

Yes it did not have the tail, that i would associate with a meteor.

Nice post mate but unfortunately without some sort of photographic proof you will probably find it hard to be taken seriously or generate any interest in the UFO forum

I understand that. The only thing i had on me was a nokia 6230 which has a 1.3 megapixel camera (from memory) it just took black no detail at all. I wish i could have taken a time lapse photograph but as you know we cant predict these things!

I understand that i cannot prove anything and i am not looking for that. I am interested if people can answer my questions in my OP as it rose from the West which would be the US but i am not sure it i could observe anything from that distance unless it was massive. Which intern would mean that other people would have surely seen something. I know the ISS is visable at the moment in the UK night sky and would like to know how long it takes to travel from horizon to horizon and would it ever fade away in the night sky?

The ISS is usually visible for between 1 and 2 minutes depending on elevation and sky visibilty where I am in the UK. I suggest you go here and plan a sighting of it to confirm whether what you saw was the ISS or not. It may take more than one viewing, as on more than a few occasions the ISS has looked quite different to me due to its bearing/position/illumination/sky background.

Well concealed cloud cover can indeed make for an early and sudden ISS "exit".

The flash is unexplainable without more information.

Hi Jon,

As others have said, it could be the ISS. It could also be another satellite. The ISS travels from West to East across the sky, other satellites tend to travel North to South or South to North.

I also saw what I thought to be the ISS that same night, but did not check the time, or if it was visible, but at a rough guess it would have been the same time. A quick check here tells me that it was indeed visible just before 11 PM that night - so there is your answer - it probably was the ISS.

As for the flash you saw, it was most likely from a tumbling satellite, space junk, or perhaps a meteor. It's pretty safe to say it was unrelated to the ISS pass.

Often when a satellite or the ISS disappears it can be due to passing into the Earth's shadow, or as someone else mentioned, it can be lost in haze or cloud, especially when it is not very bright in the first place. In this case it was quite bright for me, and I suspect for you as well, since we are not too far away, so it probably passed into Earth's shadow.

By the way, not every meteor leaves a trail/has a tail. But now that you have seen a man made object in orbit, you can easily tell them apart from the difference in speed - even the slowest meteors will cross the sky in a few tens of seconds at most (20-30 seconds is probably the upper limit). Most satellites travel at about the same rate across the sky - less than 10km/s (IIRC 8km/s is average). Meteors have a minimum speed of about 11km/s, but this is unusual to see, and the majority of slow meteors will be traveling at speeds closer to 25km/s.

I went out and observed the ISS last night at the time NASA said it would be visable. I believe the UFO i saw is now and IFO as it did look like the ISS it wasn't quite as bright last night but it was slightly more cloudy that the night i thought i saw a UFO.

Thanks for answering my questions and pointing me into the right information. I still want to see a UFO though lol. Nevermind.

Mods feel free to amend my thread title to identified.