Society for Popular Astronomy

[martinss]

Hi all,

This Fireball was captured on the hop by Graham Green of the Hants Astro group at an observing session at Intech, Winchester. It lasted approx 40 seconds and left a trail behind it as it was breaking up.

Date: 25-09-08
Time: 20:56 UT

It is clearly tumbling through the atmosphere in the cropped image and, as yet, it is a mysterious object...any ideas anyone?





Hants Astro have received reports of this fireball from Manchester, our south coast and sightings in France.

I can provide a higher resolution image than this one if anyone wants a closer look.

Thanks,

Martin
_________________
'I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people...'[/b] Sir Isaac Newton
Scope:LXD75 10" SNT, Laptop, UnModded Phillips SPC900NC, Canon EOS5D and associated bits and bobs; Also using a stolen 2.5" Skywatcher Refractor (my son's).
Websites: http://www.hantsastro.org - http://www.m109.co.uk - http://www.saban.co.uk - http://www.workingimage.co.uk . Wishlist - Moonlight Crayford[/size]

[stella]

Not mysterious - Andy Smith reports the following:
"What's reported as the re-entry of a Proton M rocket body 2008 046D launched
from Baikonur on Sept 25 around 08:49 UTC re-entered the atmosphere the same
day just after 20:54:30 UTC over northern France. I witnessed the re-entry
by radio reflection on my 143.050 MHz (Graves satellite radar) and 55.250
MHz (Belgium and Portugal TV) meteor observation systems, as did several
other radio observers in northern Europe. Attempts are being made to
coordinate observations. There were also apparently many visual observations
that were reported by French witnesses, mainly in Brittany.

This is a link to a spectrogram of my 143.050 MHZ observation:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/radiofireballs/2888579448/
Note that the angle of the slope of the Doppler line appears to change,
either indicating that the object is decelerating, or due to the change in
geometry between transmitter, object and receiver.

My location is West Devon in south-west England."

[martinss]

Great news. Thanks Stella. Have passed it on!

Martin
_________________
'I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people...'[/b] Sir Isaac Newton
Scope:LXD75 10" SNT, Laptop, UnModded Phillips SPC900NC, Canon EOS5D and associated bits and bobs; Also using a stolen 2.5" Skywatcher Refractor (my son's).
Websites: http://www.hantsastro.org - http://www.m109.co.uk - http://www.saban.co.uk - http://www.workingimage.co.uk . Wishlist - Moonlight Crayford[/size]

[Alastair McBeath]

Including the Intech image posted here, the SPA has now received six definite sightings of this September 25-26, 20:56 UT event, the others scattered across south Wales, southern England, Jersey down into central France. Due to the number of sightings made from France, I've forwarded summaries of these reports to my French colleague and counterpart Karl Antier, in the hopes we may be able to derive more details regarding the event.

Anyone else who spotted this fireball, or any others - meteors of magnitude -3 or brighter - from the British Isles or nearby is welcome to send a full report to the Meteor Section as soon as possible. The minimum details I need from you are:

1) Exactly where you were (name of the nearest town or large village and county if in Britain, or your geographic latitude and longitude if elsewhere in the world);

2) The date and timing of the event (please be sure to state whether this was in clock time, currently BST in Britain, or GMT/UT, which is BST minus one hour); and

3) Where the fireball started and ended in the sky, as accurately as possible, or where the first and last points you could see of the trail were if you didn't see the whole flight.

More advice and a fuller set of details to send are outlined on the "Fireball Observing" page of the SPA website, at: http://www.popastro.com/sections/meteor/fireball.htm .

Alastair McBeath,
Meteor Director, Society for Popular Astronomy.
E-mail: <meteor@popastro.com> (messages under 150 kB in size only, please)

[Cliff]

Dear al(L)
Sorry, but I am rather confused.
Is the repoted 25th Sep a meteor or manmade object ?
Best of luck from Cliff

[stella]

It's a man-made object launched previously the same day,
decaying at 20.55 U.T.