About those blue flashes in the sky.

Hi all,
with regard to these blue flashes seen in the sky , which I have seen myself before (but not at source), I may have seen the source of some of them this morning.

I got home from work at 02:25hrs. Where I live is in very dark country surroundings, some of you know it! When I pulled up to the cottage, I got out and just decided to look up and enjoy the silence as well as the MilkyWay after my nights' work of boom-iss-boom-iss-boom-iss-boom-iss...
Anyway, there were a few Leonid meteors, spotted 3 Lyrids, 5 Bootids, and at one stage (in a triangle drawn from Alcor to Vega to Arcturus, or 25 X 20 X 15 degrees of sky) there were 5 simultaneous satellites passing overhead.
Then, as I was looking in this direction anyway, I saw the source of a blue flash. About 2 degrees to the right of Altair, below from Vega. Very brief, pinpoint, and quite bright. Time was 02:43hrs. Can't verify for sure as I was on my own and IF my eyes played a trick on me, but there was a hint of shadow on the ground at the time.
So I kept looking at that area to see if it might happen again. And it did, about 15-20 degrees further to the right again of Altair, same flash, pinpoint of light, and definitey dimly lit the ground in front of me. that was just beore 02:46hrs.
Didn't happen any more after that, and I went inside to bed at 02:55hrs as it was getting cold.
Prior to this, one of the Bootid meteors I saw was like it was heading straight for me. You know, very short in the tail, but it was a gradual rise and fall burst, as you would know a metor to be. However, the 2 flashes were instant, and directly in my line of site too. I would be slow to mention them as fireballs, as there was no evidence left afterwards such as ion tail, smoke, fizzling etc. They were definitely bright enoughin my opinion that a movie camera woud pick them up, or even a long exposure photo.

So, you never know what you might see up there!

Seanie.

Aliens with flash photography? :lol:

Seanie great post and observing! When i read your words i got a surge of adenaline because last night myself and Conor also seen the very same object that you described in that same time slot and same area of sky. We agree that it was very bright (silver like a fireball) but as you say too sudden and of too long a duration to be a metoer/fireball so we assumed it must have been an irdium satellite perhaps in a decaying orbit or maybe some space debris turning and reflecting sunlight??? It was very bright indeed and very slow moving. At one stage we seen it shine through a patch of clouds....very cool to watch and as you say..you never know what you might see.

We seen 14 meteors last night and one fireball. Thanks for pointing out that the Bootids where active as i was not aware of this!

Great stuff!

but as you say too sudden and of too long a duration to be a metoer/fireball

Thanks Martin,
but, the duration was too sudden! I think you mean too short! The flash was like a camera flash waayy up in the sky.

we assumed it must have been an irdium satellite perhaps in a decaying orbit or maybe some space debris turning and reflecting sunlight???

I think I saw that from my perspective on the ground too. It was slowly moving, and 'twinkled' now and again. Definitely was not a plane, as they have a consistent flash of the strobe lights, and at different intervals.
This object was faint, and took about 2 minutes to cross about 30 degrees of sky from Libra into Hercules. I can't remember the time, but I guess around 02:40hrs.

It was an interesting night!

Seanie.

Seanie,
Thats interesting, it does sound like a satellite cought the sun at a perfect angle and gave you a bright flash, it would certainly explain it.
Still, it doesn't sound like an iridium style flash, its just too short.
This satellite must be spinning very quickly.

As martin was saying above we also seen this. We were standing out in the football pitch when i seen a bright flash in the sky. It was like a ball of light and didn't spread out it was a estimate of around -4. As i didn't know if this was something i had seen or my eyes tricking me i told martin and we made another sighting very shortly after i seen the first flash. We believe this was a satellite out of orbit as was flickering from time to time and the flashes were not the same brightness which suggests that it was tumbling and the light was reflecting of the different parts of the objects body. As the shorter nights draw near and the sun is getting closer in the summer nights that these will become more of a regular occurrence to see as it is to see more satellites in the summer nights. We had also seen another satellite burning up earlier but this latest a lot longer and wasn't as bright. I cant think of anything else that it could have been but its nice to know that some else was looking at the same part of the sky as we were