Strange Sighting in the sky over India

[vgk1945]

Quoting an Indian newspaper report of today:-

We see ball of fire in night sky: 10 pilots overflying India report to ATCs Pranab Dhal Samanta Posted online: Sunday, March 04, 2007 at 0000 hrs
Reports filed Saturday 1.45 am about sighting above Gujarat, DGCA asks ATC to probe

NEW DELHI, MARCH 3:Civil Aviation authorities are baffled by reports from at least 10 aircraft overflying India that they had seen a “ball of fire” in the air, about 300 nautical miles south west of Delhi, which is somewhere over Gujarat.

Sources have told The Sunday Express that all reports came in almost simultaneously, around 1.45 am this morning, and the matter is being investigated.

The description used by pilots, according to their reports, was that it appeared like a “ball of fire, orange in colour and scattered”. One pilot, in fact, said it looked like a “meteor shower”.

At first, alarmed officials checked whether any aircraft had gone missing or if there was any other disaster in the area. But all this was ruled out by afternoon.

These reports came in mostly from international aircraft overflying Indian territory. These included British Airways, Air France and Malaysian Airlines. In fact, an Air Sahara flight on the Delhi-Mumbai route also reported the same. A non-scheduled high-speed jet, too, is said to have given a similar report.

It’s learnt that Directorate General of Civil Aviation has asked Air Traffic Control authorities in Delhi to carry out preliminary inquiries into this and submit a report. On the basis of this, the DGCA will decide on the next step and will, possibly, ask the Indian Air Force to look into it as well.

DGCA officials said it is unusual for so many pilots to file similar reports, a fact which indicates they did see “something.” However, at altitudes above 26,000 feet, this would be a rare event. They added that any action would be determined upon the preliminary report by the ATC which comes under the Airports Authority of India.

Meanwhile, this has led to speculation whether this had anything to do with Pakistan’s short-range missile test that was conducted in the last 24 hours according to an announcement this morning. Pakistan had given a notice to airmen that it would carrying out a test, but the exact time was not notified. Others, however, said it is quite difficult for planes over Gujarat to be able to spot any such activity in Pakistan.

Cheers
vgk1945

[DB6]

Maybe something to do with the lunar eclipse last night?

[Few Cloudy]

We were lucky to get a great sighting of the eclipse from the southern Black Forest, where the skies had just cleared in time. And just at midnight (German time) a bright meteor or other particle did race across the dim face of the moon from South to North - quite a sight!
FC.

[DaveO'Leary]

Seems we have an Area 51 in India. Strange things happen above or below. Fellow coat hangers, be aware of the effects of the Bermuda triangle, never follow the light.....................http://www.bermuda-triangle.org/html/lost_aircraft.html
Dave
What happened to Flt 19?

Dave

[Smudger]

A meteor shower looks nothing like a ball of fire.

[RiverCity]

It appeared like a “ball of fire, orange in colour and scattered”.

A month or two ago, I saw much the same thing over Northeastern Pennsylvania. It was very large, changed color and seemed to start breaking up before it flamed out. I asked a chemist friend (US-type chemist, not the Brit kind) what elements would burn with those colors, orange and green, and he thought it was just a large meteor; I guessed a piece of space junk making its way home.

It was quite a sight, let me tell you.

[Choi oi]

Don't know if this helps, at 3AM at FL390 southbound on Eastern part of Malaysian Peninsula, was staring at the Southern Cross and the two pointes as I've done for the last 35 years, and thought my eyes or mind were playing up when I started to see a misty light coloured moon size and shape appear between the Crux and the 2 pointes then disappeared 20' later, my fellow captain and I couldn't believe it, thought it was an Orson Welles joke or a Nebula about to fry us ??????

Next day called the Sydney and Melbourne Observatories, they didn't have a clue and hand'nt heard a thing, and my captain found this, which then explained everytihng, at least the "Russians aren't coming" hehe !

Regards.

Dark Moon Tuesday 20 Feb 2007
For those of us who were up last night over PNG at approx 1710z there was what appeared to be a 'dark moon' shaped object in the sky southwest of the Southern Cross ( think the moon from Star Wars ). It was truly an amazing sight which dissolved into a cloud like mass over a period of twenty minutes. Below is the explanation from Professor Fred Watson who has a segment on ABC radio.

Thanks again for your interesting call this morning. It looks as
if what you saw was the effect of orbital manoeuvring by the
Themis spacecraft as part of the exercise to put its five
satellites into their correct orbits. Themis is designed to study
the Earth's aurora, and it was launched at the weekend. You can
find details at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6372745.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6372745.stm)

An animation made up of photos taken over half an hour. The cadence of the original photo taking varied, hence the varying speed in this animation. The debris from the explosion can be seen expanding from the rocket body, and other Earth-orbiting satellites at lower altitude can be seen passing through the field. The brightness of the plume varies as it fades and moves away in its elliptical orbit, but the sudden jumps in brightness and the appearance of more small objects later in the animation is due to increasing effective exposure, both ISO and exposure time increase.

Initially thought to be related to the recent Themis launch, this object has been ID'd with the help of the US Air Force Space Surveillance System personel, and turns out to be an exploding Breeze-M rocket body. They later detected over 500 individual pieces on RADAR. The following day over 1100 peices were resolved by the RADAR. The image below is a median of several images of the rocket burn and a swarm of bits within it. A median was used to help cancel out the background star images, but differential motion of the individual pieces has blurred the ones furthest from the ones used for the manual image alignment

A couple of my colleagues monitored the event - have a look at

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~loomberah/themis.htm (http://members.ozemail.com.au/~loomberah/themis.htm)

[Ontariotech]

Choi....good work. CASE CLOSED!


Next!:}

[ChocksAwayUK]

That's just what they want you to think. :suspect:

(Interesting stuff)

[blackace]

A meteor shower looks nothing like a ball of fire.

No, but there is a well known phenomena that does look like a ball of fire. Strangely enough it is called a "Fireball" or a "Bolide".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolide

They can appear as a slow moving extremely large and bright red or multicoloured meteors and separate into many parts as they disintegrate in the atmosphere. In fact they look exactly like what is described in the reports here.

I have seen one myself many years ago and was dismayed to find the local paper reporting "Alien mother ship passes through atmosphere" the next day.

Fireballs do not even have to impact the earth, there is a famous film of one passing over America looking like a huge burning spaceship spitting out all kinds of debris, this object skimmed the atmosphere and returned to space.

Fortunately they are natural objects and should not be mistaken for little green men.

[Alpha 6]

It could be St. Elmo's fire

St. Elmo's fire is an electroluminescent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroluminescence) coronal discharge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corona_discharge) caused by the ionization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion) of the air (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air) during thunderstorms (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderstorm) inside of a strong electric field (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_field). Although referred to as "fire", St. Elmo's fire is in fact a low density, relatively low temperature plasma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_%28physics%29) caused by massive atmospheric (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_atmosphere) electrical potential differences (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_difference) which exceed the dielectric breakdown (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dielectric_breakdown) value of air (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air) at around 3 megavolts per meter. St. Elmo's fire is named after Erasmus of Formiae (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erasmus_of_Formiae) (also called St. Elmo), the patron saint (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patron_saint) of sailors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailor) (who sometimes held its appearance to be auspicious). Alternatively, Peter Gonzalez (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Gonzalez) is said to be the St. Elmo after whom St. Elmo's fire has its name. - Wikipidea

A6

[oceancrosser]

It’s learnt that Directorate General of Civil Aviation has asked Air Traffic Control authorities in Delhi to carry out preliminary inquiries into this and submit a report. On the basis of this, the DGCA will decide on the next step and will, possibly, ask the Indian Air Force to look into it as well.
It seems entirely appropriate for the Indians to procure some paperwork on this event... :}
DGCA officials said it is unusual for so many pilots to file similar reports, a fact which indicates they did see “something.” However, at altitudes above 26,000 feet, this would be a rare event.
And we have all seen this frequently BELOW 26,000 feet :confused:

[Beausoleil]

You can find videos of the fireball that led to the Peekskil meteorite here...

http://aquarid.physics.uwo.ca/~pbrown/Videos/peekskill.htm