Flashes in the Night Sky

You piqued my curiosity....

so I googled "night sky flashes", and the first hit was this.

I remember seeing this same phenomena in the mid 80's, while posted at Ft Polk, LA, USA.

No explanation then and none now.

Interesting.

'Seems that this is not uncommon. Haven't seen any flashes for the past few nights though. Moon's out and I can only see a few stars. The International Space Station was visible for about a minute just before 7pm but nothing else interesting othewise.

I was thinking of meteors that come in directly in line with my sight which would explain why I saw a flash and not a streak. That doesn't explain why I saw other flashes from other directions, however.

I'm aware of iridium flashes but the flashes I saw were split second ones, like a camera flash except from far, far away (should have smiled I guess ).

I forgot all about google! I'll do my own research tomorrow maybe. No time right now.

regards,

Vulcan

Oddly, enough, the same thing was reported in the news here a couple days ago (that's in Newfoundland, Canada). People saw these unusual flashes in the sky (I missed it, alas ) Quite a few people saw it and some effort was made to rustle up an answer. The most likely scientific answer was given, that this is a form of lightning occurring very high up, as opposed to the usual lightning which, as one viewer said "lights up the sky, but nothing like this". Apparently very high up there, very big charges, and big bright light.

My usual source for answers about this kind of stuff is http://spaceweather.com/ They might answer your question better than what I got from the local news if you pose it to them with a description of what you saw.

Darn! Internet connections very slow tonight. I'll have to post my answers tomorrow.

I wasn't scared when I saw the flashes, just curious. Definitely not lightning since there were absolutely no clouds when I first saw them (can lightning exist without clouds? another thing to look up).

Thanks for the link, I'll check up on it tomorrow.

regards,

Vulcan

can lightning exist without clouds?

Yes. Lightning is known to occur during volcanic eruptions. Lightning can also extend for miles out in front of a large storm (supercell), thus the expression "bolt out of the blue."

***

I'm also wondering about the elevation of those flashes above the horizon. If they were the same number of degrees above the horizon, or if they lined up in an arc, that could indicate the flashed might have been small pieces of space junk burning up when they hit the atmosphere. IIRC, two satellites collided not too long ago in the area you first mentioned.

If they were the same number of degrees above the horizon

No, definitely not at the same elevation.

if they lined up in an arc

No, they didn't line up either. The first came from the north-west (ish), the second from north-east and the third from north. Unless, the thing made a rather large zig-zag, it doesn't look like something from a single object.

About the two satellites that collided, it's possible that I saw bits and pieces that are burning up as they reenter. Two small to make a streak but large enough to be visible as it burned up.

regards,

Vulcan

Do you know any ham radio operators in your area? They might be able to confirm if you are seeing a meteor shower.

As meteors enter the atmosphere, they create an ionized trail that reflects or refracts radio signals in the VHF range. Hams try to make contact by "bouncing" signals off these ionized trails. Because the trails, or "burns," are so short-lived, the preferred method of contact is by computer-generated Morse code, or HSMS (High Speed Meteor Scatter). Hams that like to "work the rocks" often call themselves "ping jockeys."

I'm not sure if HSMS is as popular in the Philippines as it is here in the US, but it wouldn't hurt to ask around.

No, I don't know of any ham radio operators nearby, unfortunately. I don't think ham radio is very popular in the Philippines though I used to study at a college that had one (part of the Electronics and Communications Engineering course required you to be able to operate it).

Thanks for the input anyway.

regards,

Vulcan

GA! An expansion upon the Iridium Flares: read the FAQs at http://www.heavens-above.com/faq.aspx?lat=0&lng=0&alt=0&loc=Unspecified&TZ=CET under that heading. You'd expect a very short duration flash of light as a particular sqtellite passed into and out of alignment between the sun, itself, and the observer. In effect, this is akin to someone trying to use a signal mirror from an incredibly long distance: maintaining alignment for even a fraction of a second is unlikely, since all elements are moving relative to one another.

Regards.

A good reply.

For information of co-ordinates [Longitudes & Latitudes ] of any city or town can be looked & the surrounding to it all localities co-ordinates as well.

I am using it for looking different satelites location & Coordinates of places of intrest

Thanks

The explanation may be right or it may be a safer explanation.

But, I have observed hundreds of Irridium flashes over last many years. My experience is, it is not really very short duration flash. It is normally 10-15 seconds flash. Sometimes you can even see the satellite much earlier some 20-30 seconds earlier before it flashes.

I am used to the fact that satellites are usually not visible (most of them anyway) after 7:30pm at my location. The flashes I saw came around 9:30pm. After seeing some Iridium flash schedules around that time, I may revise my thinking that these weren't Iridium flares.

Thanks for the links. I just got more things to watch out for on starry nights.

regards,

Vulcan

Alien tourists taking pictures?

Unfortunately, no matter how many ideas people post, this will forever remain unknown observation. There just is not enough data here.

That being said, I like the lightning idea. But not the common lightning associated with a storm going cloud to cloud or cloud to ground. I remember NASA discovering a new type of lightning that goes up from the stratosphere into the ionosphere. My hazy memory tells me blue jet lightning was the name of this.

Another possible cause for your flashes could be a non-geosynchronous satellite that's spinning. Something flat (solar panel, or dish antenna?) occasionally the geometries are just right to reflect sunlight back down to earth. The remaining time the satellite image is so small that nothing shows to the naked eye. The fact that you saw several successive flashes in different locations of the sky, implies a trajectory.

The last possibility to my mind, several tiny micro-meteor explosions. In this scenario a dust cloud enters the earth's atmosphere. The tiny particles produce to small of an ion trail to be seen, until the whole dust particle pops with an explosion. Granted this is not very likely but clearly you don't have a frequent phenomena.

Granted this is not very likely but clearly you don't have a frequent phenomena.

No worse than the tourists theory.

"Another possible cause for your flashes could be a non-geosynchronous satellite that's spinning. Something flat (solar panel, or dish antenna?) occasionally the geometries are just right to reflect sunlight back down to earth. The remaining time the satellite image is so small that nothing shows to the naked eye. The fact that you saw several successive flashes in different locations of the sky, implies a trajectory."

I gather that you read only the posts in this thread, and didn't bother to follow the various links, eh? Note that Iridium Flashes are generally predictable, so if the time and location of observations is known, one can check on whether that is a likely cause. Other satellites may obviously generate similar phenomena, so not all flashes will be matched by Iridium predictions. A more complete set of tracking data would undoubtedly eliminate the "unknown" from many more events, if only by confirming presence of a suitable source at the location & time. And even a non-spinning and geosynchronous satellite must be changing angular position relative to the sun, so could cause a flash at the observer's location if it had a sufficiently large flat reflective surface.

Yes, I posted my reply before reading the link of your post. While I was crafting my reply, your post appeared. Kinda hard to read a reply before you see it. But enough with the callous remarks, for now.

In retrospect, my original post implies my dismissal of geosynchronous satellites by the apparent track of the observation. My dismissal actually comes from the distance away from earth and the relative size of any of these birds. I doubt any unaided human eye could see reflected solar light off an image that small.

I do like and respect your remark that other satellites that aren't as well documented as the Iridium satellites could also be responsible.

The primary thrust of my original comment is that without knowing any true pertinent details of this observation, this will always be a mystery.

this will always be a mystery

Agree. Nothing like a good mystery to keep things interesting.

regards,

Vulcan

Another possibility occurred to me a few minutes ago: missile tests.

I first thought of the test facility at Kwajalein, but it sits directly to the east of the Philippines.



They probably wouldn't conduct any tests near the Philippines, but another outfit might.

A Tulsa company, Aeromet, does extensive and intensive weather monitoring for the tests. I got to tour their facilities several years ago.

Hello 3Doug,

I still don't know what they are but I'm beginning to think that they may be pieces of the two satellites that collided a couple of months ago. I've been reading about people who saw similar things and they all seem fairly recent.

I'm not sure if they are missles. I would think that such things would be visible as a spot of light that rises up. I don't know if they exploded in the upper atmosphere though.

'Wish I had a good telescope. Binoculars are certainly not meant for star gazing.

regards,

Vulcan