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Baz posted an update 8 years ago
I think that Chinese satellite just re-entered the atmosphere…
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Baz posted an update 8 years ago
I think that Chinese satellite just re-entered the atmosphere…
Did you see it as an “artificial meteor shower”? Or (less exciting) read a news report? I have been waiting to see where it would fall…
Neither. I was outside at 05.00hrs smokin’ a smoke and saw a really bright object in the eastern sky appx 50 degrees above the horizon. It appeared to be a single and slightly elongated white-silver object “embedded” in a nebulous glowing cloud or nimbus-like enclosure. I watched it for five minutes. It seemed to drift down towards the horizon quite slowly, getting faint only just before it disappeared. The glowing cloud seemed to persist for a few minutes after that, distinctly visible, but having become more diffuse and duller. I suspect that if this was the satellite I was probably directly behind it; I saw no streaks nor trails. It had an apparent trajectory past two stars which didn’t change in luminosity. There were no clouds in the sky, the weather was fine. And it was still dark.
Wow. Interesting about the slowness of it…. sounds almost as if it floated through the upper layers of the atmosphere.
Given that there have been no reports of Tiangong 1’s re-entry I’m heading outside in a few minutes for another squizz…
So maybe you something altogether more interesting!
The only thing I saw, which was about 0510hrs, was in exactly the same area of the sky; a small light travelling south-east, parallel with the horizon, which lasted for about 30 seconds. Ordinarily I would have to assume that this faint light would be a mundane satellite (it was before dawn and thus reflecting sunlight) however, it didn’t appear yesterday morning while I was looking at the original object. For the record I live in the close vicinity of a civilian airport, and not far away from a military air-base, but I have never observed anything quite so unusual which might have originated from them. I will have another look on Sunday morning.