Mystery Object Discovered in Earths Orbit

Originally posted by Devino
Could debris from a mission make it around the Moon and back into Earth orbit on its own?

All it has to do is not hit the moon; the moon orbits the earth and without the moon as a target the path of an apollo mission is just a very elongated earth orbit. The real question is whether or not a gravity perturbtion by the moon months later causes it to lower its perigee back into the atmosphere. If not, then it'll continue to orbit indefinitely. In the case of the S-IVBs though, they were ejected into solar orbits if they weren't targeted to hit the moon so that there would be no risk of collision with the command module later on during any course corrections. Those S-IVBs may re-encounter the earth from time to time and be loosely and temporarily recaptured.

Maybe NASA's LCROSS mission actually missed the Moon and this is what we are seeing.

I detected it as being on course only a day before impact, so that's rather unlikely.

[edit on 28-10-2009 by ngchunter]

We all thirst for something more don't we? God's, Aliens, Ghosts. Would be cool if just once something truly out there happened like it being an ancient satellite or Alien ship.

That is what this site really is about. Exploring our fantasy of something more.

I hope its something more than space trash or common asteroid etc...

Originally posted by squiz
OK, couldn't resist posting this for obvious reasons, but this is fascinating whatever the case may be.

MYSTERY OBJECT: Yesterday, astronomers in Arizona, New Mexico and Spain, all hunting for near-Earth asteroids, discovered a "mystery object" orbiting Earth. Temporarily named "9U01FF6," it is small and in an elongated, 31-day orbit. Experts say it is probably a piece of an Apollo-era Moon mission. We'll get a closer look on Oct. 29th when it zips past Earth about 82,000 km (0.2 lunar distances) away. Advanced amateur astronomers can find it using this ephemeris.

www.spaceweather.com...

Haha, have it folks. Do we say it's swinging round for another orbit ready to land next month?

But really, this is cool.

Funny how 9U01FF6 looks a lot like Lucifer! I say hoax.

reply to post by maya27


Sorry but how do you know that it looks like lucifer

reply to post by druid1


The assigned name/number & article, not the object, which probably doesn't exist.

Originally posted by OpTiMuS_PrImE
reply to post by Erasurehead

 

will they be viewing it tomorrow or something?

From the OP:
We'll get a closer look on Oct. 29th when it zips past Earth about 82,000 km (0.2 lunar distances) away.

Lets see what tomorrow brings..

Originally posted by ngchunter

Originally posted by Erasurehead
It will be very interesting to see what happens tomorrow the 29th when we will have a better look at it.

Unless it's the mothership /sarc it'll be a dot, even on the 29th.

It doesn't sound right to me that this is an old rocket stage from the apollo missions. I would think that someone would have spotted it by now if that was the case.

There are plenty of them that have yet to be spotted. In fact, Apollo 12's S-IVB is the only non-destroyed apollo S-IVB that we've spotted so far.

Just a dot? Its not that far out there is it?
I would think they could point the Hubble telescope at it and get a real good look.

reply to post by maya27


Sorry friend you have really lost me here.
How does 9U01FF6 in an article from Space Weather.com look like lucifer?
I think that if you are going to comment you shouldlat least read the thread. This is very interesting stuff and I for one am glad that the op brought it to my attention...

reply to post by druid1


All I am saying is that the temporary name assigned to it kind of looked like the word LUCIFER, and I immediately thought wind-up.

How you conclude that I didn't read the thread is strange.

I thinks it is this Mothership maybe with a cloaking mechanism

RE: The Black Knight

Would somebody from the public domain not have noticed something tlike this before and brought it to somebody's attention, and probably a forum like this?

ok, its the 29th already; so ftw is really?

Originally posted by Erasurehead
Just a dot?

Its not that far out there is it?

82,000km is pretty far, especially for trying to resolve an object as more than a point light source. Most satellites, even in low earth orbit, are just dots as well. For comparison, here's a soviet satellite that was only 18,000km away when I took the picture:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/f61b66b73653.jpg[/atsimg]
It's the dot, the streak is a star.

I would think they could point the Hubble telescope at it and get a real good look.

I could be wrong, but it's probably moving too fast for Hubble to keep pace with it. Hubble certainly isn't designed for satellite tracking and now that there will be no further servicing missions I'm sure they wouldn't want to put extra wear on its reaction wheels (used for pointing).

Originally posted by maya27
reply to post by druid1

 

The assigned name/number & article, not the object, which probably doesn't exist.

Why do you say the object doesn't exist? I guess I'm going to have to go take a picture of it tonight, not just because it's close to earth, but to prove it exists lol.

Originally posted by Erasurehead
...I would think they could point the Hubble telescope at it and get a real good look.

Hubble telescope time is a very precious thing. People have been lined up for years waiting for Hubble to point at their particular object of interest. There is, however, a thing called "Director's Discretionary" time on the telescope: This is time set aside for things of interest that may occur in space that are time-sensitive -- such as a supernova. At the Hubble team's discretion, this telescope time can be "shoehorned" in between users already on the waiting list.

HOWEVER, this time is set aside for scientifically interesting objects for which Hubble is the best tool for viewing. While this object is a "little" interesting, I don't think it qualifies.

Even if it was important to find out what this thing is right now (which it isn't), there is no reason to believe that Hubble would be able to positively identify this object any better than ground-based telescopes to make it worth Hubble's time and money.

[edit on 10/29/2009 by Soylent Green Is People]

reply to post by ngchunter


Thanks for educating me about this topic. I find this stuff very interesting.
Do you have any plans to at least attempt to take a look at this object today? Has there been any updated news?

Most likely just space junk but wouldn't it be exciting if it turned out to be something unexpected?

I think about our own deep space probe missions like Voyager and think that maybe there is a chance that this could end up being a deep space probe sent by a far away civilization to check out our solar system.

Perhaps they detected planets around our sun much like we have been discovering around distant stars and they sent a probe out to take a closer look. I do admit that this highly unlikely but not impossible so it is worth a look.



[edit on 10/29/2009 by Erasurehead]

Originally posted by Erasurehead
reply to post by ngchunter

 

Thanks for educating me about this topic. I find this stuff very interesting.
Do you have any plans to at least attempt to take a look at this object today? Has there been any updated news?

I have plans, subject to what my wife says, subject to how early my daughter goes down, subject to the weather, and subject to my overall level of wakeness a day after a major late night grant application lol. /rant sorry lol. Yes, if I can I'll try to take a look, but considering that the TLE (orbital elements) are currently off anywhere from 60-several hundred kilometers, it's possible I could miss it unless I spend all night fishing for it. It's like trying to find a nanoscale needle in a haystack.

Most likely just space junk but wouldn't it be exciting if it turned out to be something unexpected?

Sure would, SETA studies have always interested me. It's worth a look at least.

I think about our own deep space probe missions like Voyager and think that maybe there is a chance that this could end up being a deep space probe sent by a far away civilization to check out our solar system.

I agree; detection of a foreign automated probe is probably the best chance for alien intelligence detection there is.

*just an update: I drove through rain on the way home tonight so I don't think I'm going to risk getting the telescope wet. It doesn't much matter since there are no TLE's published for this object for today; apparently the TLE method just isn't accurate enough to track an object like this with such an elliptical orbit when it's this close to earth. The next time the TLE method becomes viable is Nov 1st. Unfortunately the satellite tracking software I use with my telescope only accepts TLEs, so I'm SOL till then.

[edit on 29-10-2009 by ngchunter]

Well... I think that 'mystery object' should have passed Earth by now - so what was it? Has every telescope on Earth suddenly gone blind?

reply to post by Larryman


unless its slowing down! /ominous music

Reality is like the worse science fiction show ever. Wheres my jetpack?

Originally posted by Larryman
Well... I think that 'mystery object' should have passed Earth by now - so what was it? Has every telescope on Earth suddenly gone blind?

Well I wasn't going to risk mine to the weather, and this thing is a **** to track until they nail the orbit down better, but the bottom line is that it's currently in earth orbit so that means it will pass by earth again. There's plenty of time left to observe it, I plan to do so myself as soon as I can.