Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
The difficulties of identifying a specific aircraft, at night, in a background of stationary and moving lights, when moving objects on a collision course will always appear stationary to each other, are well known.
Whilst maybe not a factor here, that is only true when neither object is accelerating (for example in a turn). This has often been quoted in the thread and it's worth remembering that even if the other object shows relative movement it might still hit you (or vice versa).