Strange Flashes in the night sky ,what are they,and have you seen them?

Myself, interestedalways and Kruel were standing together at 11:11 pm, about a month or so ago when we saw this phenomena as well.

Stationary in the clear night sky, growing larger and brighter from a single point in the inside atmosphere.

It was a huge flash just like we were being photographed.

After the 'flash' it was gone.

Well, I don't know about you, but where I am, the Zenith is just about the only part of the sky I can easily make out stars that are below about 0 mag in brightness on a clear night. Pretty much all else is lost in light pollution. Perhaps where you are is not so bad, but I suspect that you are only seeing them there because they are much more easily seen where the sky is darkest (and the atmosphere is more transparent).

reply to post by C.H.U.D.


I live in a semi rural location near the coast.On a clear night I can see alot of stars and sats with the naked eye. If I use my scope or even my binoculars I can see deep into space. Its not as clear as when we stayed in a small village called Martins Town in Dorset, at night there it is pitch black with no street lamps and the stars look amazing.
Ps I still can not work the smileys.How do you edit? All I get is the word come up on the post page. Thanks tarifa

That's kind of funny I notice this thread today as last night I standing by my studio door just outside and I noticed a police helicopter flying towards my location in the distance when all of a sudden a huge green burst of light filled most of the eastern sky. Unfortunately there was a tree directly in front of the origin of the light but it was huge with no sound at all. The Police helicopter didn't seem to react other then turn around and go back the way it came. There was a marine layer over the basin her last night too (it was about 11pm) but this light was huge and seemed to come from the sky but there where no stars/satellites visible or anything through the clouds.

[edit on 10-7-2008 by Shakesbeer]

I have seen the falling star which at the same time flashes green.
I am going with the UFO dimension theory at the moment until a
better suggestion appears.

reply to post by antar


antar - this sounds allot like a "point-meteor" (a meteor that is heading straight for you) to me. How long did it last?

reply to post by tarifa37


I think if you keep looking you should see them elsewhere in the sky then. Sorry cant help with your other question, but to edit a post, there is a link at the top right of the post. However, the option to edit disappears after 3 hours.

reply to post by headlightone


That also sounds like a meteor to me. Green is not at all an unusual color for meteors. Try searching this forum, and you will find lots of references to green meteors.

reply to post by C.H.U.D.


A point meteor could be right, however it only lasted perhaps 10 seconds after it began to apparently swell.

I have to say that it did not look like a natural source of light, it did not appear to have the same density of astronomical lighting effects.

Thankyou for your ideas and thoughts.

reply to post by antar


antar,

10 seconds almost certainly rules out point meteors. The chances of seeing one lasting that long are along the lines of buying a winning lottery ticket, although it is possible, and even more so if there was high or very high meteor activity at the time. You would certainly know if that was the case though, so we can probably rule that out.

Edit to add: After re-reading your description of the event, it does seem to have all the characteristics of an object burning up in the atmosphere, just like a meteor often gets to a point where it cannot take any more, and there is a massive failure in structural integrity resulting in bright flash (or "terminal burst" as they are called when they result in the destruction of the main mass of the object).


source

The above is a textbook example of a very large terminal burst, seen at an angle obviously, and obviously much brighter than the event you observed (and 99.9999% of all other meteors at a rough guess). but it demonstrates the typical "light curve" (change in brightness over time) of a meteor, or very bright fireball in this particular case. In other cases the increase in brighness at the end is more pronounced and sudden, like what you saw.

Is there any chance that you over-estimated the time? If it was closer to 5 seconds, then the meteor possibility becomes a bit more probable, but it's still a long time for a meteor. I'd be more inclined to accept the possibility of a meteor in this case if you had said that the flash occurred close to, or when you first observed the brightening since meteors can leave luminous trains behind which can easily linger and gradually fade over the course of a few seconds.

Again, this is all assuming that what you saw was a point, or an near-point meteor.




I don't see any reason why it could not have been very slow moving space junk, especially if it was observed in a part of the sky away from stars. Without points of reference close by, our brains may perceive a very slow moving object to appear to be stationary.

I think it's worth remembering that under certain circumstances our eyes and brain can play tricks on us. Unfortunately, looking at the night sky, seems to be one of those circumstances under which the brain is easily tricked. That also goes for estimates of distance/altitude as this page here explains.

Of course, there is always the possibility what you saw was a truly stationary flare, although IMHO slim, in which case we might have a truly un-identifiable object.

There is one other possibility, which is a glint off a geo-stationary satellite, but I think these are also very rare.

[edit on 10-7-2008 by C.H.U.D.]

reply to post by C.H.U.D.


Sorry where does "this lasts for 10 seconds" thing come from? My flashes only lasted upto 1 second and others followed in about a 10 second period overall.

A thought sprung to mind:

What about the possibility of NIGHT SATELLITE PHOTOGRAPHY or spying?

I don't see why the powers wouldn't attempt this, there are hundreds of satellites floating up there over areas of land covered in darkness, so new technology might try using a crude flash technique much like a conventional camera to light the area long enough to take a photograph.

I know satellites can take infared, radio and night vision photographs but there is nothing better than a clearly and accurately lit shot.

Rigging satellites with night flashes is probably something we wouldn't hear about in the MSM too, because I think people would object.

What do you think?

Regards S_G

reply to post by C.H.U.D.


That's what I saw - brilliant pic! Terminal Blast it was!!! It lasted a fraction of a second, the tail formed for (aparently) 3mm before the blast. Problem solved (at least for me) Terminal Blast sounds far better than my "meteor exploding". I'm still amazed that so many people are seeing the same or similar at the moment.



[edit on 11/7/08 by Insomniac]

reply to post by tarifa37


The 10 seconds was in response to antar's observation.


reply to post by xSMOKING_GUNx


It's a good idea S_G, but I doubt it's possible from a technical point of view. The trouble with it is that light intensity falls off very fast with distance (inverse square law), so you would need an extremely bright flash to light anything on the ground up enough to be seen from space in the dark. Also, there would be major problems with noise in any photographs taken due to the sensor technology we have, and there are hard physical limits on this.

In short, it would make more sense for them to spy at night using wavelengths other than visible light.


reply to post by Insomniac


Well, it's actually called a "burst", but "blast" might be more more appropriate in that particular case

reply to post by C.H.U.D.


Ok ,thanks I did not have time to go through all the posts this morning. I thought someone had miss read my account of the flash.
Thanks for putting me straight. Tarifa37

Saw a flash similar to a few descriptions. 20 to 30 degrees east of the Big Dipper, brilliant blue-white, about the size of a bright star. It was not bright enough to light up the yard or even the sky around it but almost dazzling like a laser. Aprox. 0630zulu, Calgary, Canada.

I unknowingly started a topic about something similar to this. Here is the link of my post.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I am in the cornfields about 40 to 50 miles West of Chicago. On the 5th or 6th we had a fire pit going and there were three of us. It was around midnight and we were looking up and also saw three flashes that looked like bright stars. They did not light up the whole sky. They were close together but if traveling they were on different trajectories so it had to be three different objects or flashes. I have been looking around trying to see if anyone else saw this. I track satellites and the space station and meteor showers and this was not any of them.

Originally posted by Shakesbeer
all of a sudden a huge green burst of light filled most of the eastern sky...

I know someone who said they had seen a green flash of light in the sky, shortly after the power went out in the area.

I've seen a green meteor myself which was cool but probably quite normal and just made up of certain stuff, zinc perhaps?

A few nights ago i was looking out my window about 1am and after a few minutes i saw a bright flash that lasted a second, it was not a streak like a meteor but a point flash of light, probably space junk or sats at the right angle, however on my previous report of a day time point flash i have thought about it and i doubt its an iridium flare or plane as the flash wasn't actually a flash but a point of light that lit up stayed on for about 5 seconds and was stationary, not sure now but i suppose space junk and sats are still the most likely answer.

I too started a thread about something similar to this. The title is a bit misleading, i know, but thats how i would describe the one that i saw head on.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I just saw a very quick, bright, white flash in the sky. It was South/South West, 70 degrees from the ground, somewhat near the arrow on the Sag. constellation. I is what I imagine a supernova might look like. It seemed very far away and was stationary, unlike a meteor. It was about 4 times brighter than Jupiter is right now in the sky. It only happened once at about 10pm central time. I live about 12 miles north of Austin, TX. I found this sight by googling 'flash in the sky'. Am intrigued to see others write about it. Hmmm

reply to post by rocksolidbrain


Wierd..I just saw 2 green flashes that lasted about 2 secs each!Im in TN though!