Unidentified Flying Objects

me own eyes | 12-1-1

[jungleboy]

Just witnessed two very fast traveling objects in the sky that had very colorful, streaking objects following them. This WAS NOT meteor activity as the local TV station guessed. These objects came out of the Southwest sky heading Northeast. My wife and I watched them for about one minute as they dissappeared over the horizon. Northeastern Kansas. Anyone else see this?

[Davea]

The Vandenberg launch was cancelled due to weather.

[Lady In Blue]

I just checked defenselink.com site and it was postponed until tomorrow evening from 9:00p.m.EST to approximately 1:00a.m. due to poor weather conditions.

[lilsparky]

I don't have the source handy, but seems to me that a Japanese satellite was going to come down sometime soon. I remember that they expected most of it to burn up harmlessly, and at the time of the article weren't even sure of where or when.

[dalebert]

I have seen things like this several times. Never found out what it was.

[John H K]

I just saw the same speculation on the meteorobs mailing list. If this is JERS-1, it came down just a hair earlier than forecast.

http://www.nasda.go.jp/jers1/index_e.html

Re-entry of Japanese Earth Resource Satellite-1 (JERS-1)
The Japanese Earth Resource Satellite-1 (JERS-1) has finished its mission and will soon reentry in December, 2001.

The National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) launched JERS-1 by H-1 Launch Vehicle from Tanegashima Space Center in February, 1992.

JERS-1 is an earth observation satellite whose primary objective is to gather data on global land masses while conducting observation for land surveys, agricultural-forestry-fishieries, environmental protection, disaster prevention and coastal surveillance, with emphasis on locating natural resources. JERS-1 is a joint project of the Science and Technology Agency (STA) / NASDA and the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI). STA / NASDA were responsible for the main satellite unit and MITI was responsible for the measuring instruments. Since its launching in 1992, the satellite had continued to supply observation data to users in Japan and abroad and ended the mission on October 12, 1998.

NASDA is making an orbital analysis with the cooperation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and Japan Spaceguard Association and giving the latest information on this site.

Orbital analysis of JERS-1 NASDA(Tsukuba Space Center)
Orbital analysis as of December 2, 2001

Re-entry date : from 00:00 p.m on December 3 to 03:00 a.m on December 4

(strong possibility : 06:00 p.m on December 3)

[John H K]

All Leonids travel at the exact same (extremely high) speed....it takes a Leonid only a second or two to cross the horizon (and I was fortunate to see a horizon-to-horizon earthgrazer two weeks ago.) Also, the shower is long over and it's not one of the long-lasting ones.

This moved extremely slowly.

[Professor Jim]

Meteors can be in the sky for a few seconds and can seem longer. They can burn, explode, and pop along the way. Once I could even hear the explosion of such a fireball.

Satellites, on the other hand, move more slowly across the sky, taking minutes usually. They usually look sort of like planets but move visibly.

Comets have tails, but do not appear to move in the sky.

If the descriptions are accurate, these objects had the speed of a satellite, but the appearance of a fireball meteor. Thus, returning obiting space junk is by far the likeliest explanation.

[hmmmmm]

Yes! I was beginning to think I was nuts *l*. I saw them also in the KC metro. They appeared to be quite a number of planes (could the color have been from afterburners?). They were moving from basically the southwest to the northeast in a level, straight line. I ran outside to get a better look. At first glance they appeared to be 2 orange streaks, when I got outside I could see what appeared to be planes and they were somewhat staggered, my count was about 15-20. At the end there was 1 plane in the middle of the 2 streaks, I could see the contrails on it. Within the next few minutes there were several more planes at fairly regular intervals. I sure would like to know exactly what it was.

[The Bolt]

I've seen something similar before on a couple of occasions, however I was in a mental ward within a couple of days, so that don't count. Ha! Just kidding. What were you thinking at the moment you saw this fleeting apparition, if you don't mind my asking? Brain wave dependant phenomenon are not uncommon.

[Turk2]

The direction of motion also seems to imply a deorbiting satellite or space junk (which is mostly left-over stages from launch vehicles or old satellites just left in orbit to be deorbited naturally by atmospheric drag). Good call on the color change by the way.

[My Favorite Headache]

Santa?>>>

LMFAO..Must be.

[brat]

Just saw one last week. It was hovering over Las Vegas Strip. I watched it for 10 minutes with my binoculars. I thought I was seeing things.

[GeronL]

Of course I saw them, they were dropping me off. They are very nice feline-humanoid creatures named Katarans. They have been studying this planet to see if they originated here and were created by genetic scientists.

See they have some genetic flaws and humans may some day e able to help fix them. They are starting to think that the scientists who made them were from about the year 2106 and were able to time back in time to colonize a planet 18.9 light years away with Katarans.

[chaosagent]

Apocalypse Troll!

[blondee123]

could it be dorothy & toto? (sorry couldn't resist when you said KANSAS)

[Hemlock]

My wife said it was angles, it was something out of this world.

They kinda looked like Visigoths to me, or maybe Saxons.

[Commie Basher]

You MUST report this to the Weekly Universe -- NOW!

Before the Men In Black arrive!

Hurry!

[Travis McGee]

bttt

[El Gato]

The Vandenberg launch was cancelled due to weather.

And would have been going the other way in any event. That is towards the southwest from Vandy. Towards Kwaj. Although the kill vehicle would be on an approprimate reciprical course. But as you say, that was scrubbed for WX.