Anyone out last night? I need some help.

[claire1985]

My sister just said around 11.30pm she looked outside and above the moon saw something bright and looked like it had green and red lights, she's convinced it was a UFO

[long_arms]

Just above the moon last night was Jupiter, very bright.

I'm not sure what the conditions were like where you are, but where I was the transparency was pretty poor so Jupiter was certainly twinkling. Not as much as sirius (it was twinkling so much I was thinking how someone would see that as a ufo)

Dan

[Mattscar]

There are several geo-satalittes hanging round over the midlands at the moment (Im viewing from about 20 miles north of birmingham). Some of them become visible then not again several times over a night. They mainly appear to be flashing red white and blue to my eyes, but if only glanced or seen through a cloud or if the light from something else was coming into play they could very well appear to flash green.

Of course Id rather it was a UFO, however its far more likely to either be a sat or a very high up plane which is alot more boring

[barkis]

Here's a screen shot of the West Northwest horizon AT 11:30 last night.

Jupiter is labelled above the moon.

Atmospheric dispersion can cause bright objects to display red and Blue colour which scintillates when the object is low on the horizon.

Sirius is a prime example of this phenomena, but other bright bodies can also be affected.

Ron.

[claire1985]

Thanks for the replies :-) she's convinced it was Jupiter now. X

[Stargazer_00]

Bright objects can suffer from an optical illusions called scintillation. I saw this once on Sirius as it was clearly clashing in the sky solid green, red, yellow, blue, white, purple, red and so on. I was convinced in my ignorance that I was seeing something rare like a precursor to supernova or something. Turns out its quite common and is just mist in the air refracting the point source.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scintillation_(astronomy)

That or you could;ve just been too drunk

[starman1969]

I'd go with UFO.

[Russty]

or aircraft nav lights.

[Daniel-K]

hovering helicopter

[barkis]

Well, UFO it could have been, but let's not equate UFO with an alien spacecraft, because what the lady saw, was not an alien spacecraft.

Ron.

[claire1985]

If she'd had seen a UFO I'd be pretty annoyed that I'd missed it!

I've managed to convince get it was Jupiter but something slightly more worrying is what she asked me after, and I quote 'is the moon a planet?'

For the love of all that is holy give me strength not to slap my sister right around her noggin!!

[Stargazer_00]

At least she asked a question rather than just assuming the moon is a planet. In fairness it's not a bad question either, sat next to Mercury you'd have a hard time telling them apart, and the moon does orbit the sun as often as the earth. It just happens to orbit the earth too

[Stu]

I know what you mean, but I sometimes think the way we classify moons somehow robs us of seeing that we have more planets in the Solar system!

There is an argument that the Earth and Moon are a double planetary system, Titan is bigger than Mercury and the Gallilean moons are not dissimilar in size to the moon, smaller but not like moons of other planets like Mars for instance.

So, in the rebellious mood that i am in this morning, I say that we have 13 planets in the Solar System. A bit more exciting that way ;-)

Said with tongue in cheek but actually I do think the way we classify things affects how we view them.

Stu

[Stargazer_00]

We certainly do.

Planets - objects that that move in the same planar oribt as us around the sun.

Moon, from the one we can see, an object which rotates us one a month. Calling the other rocky objects which rotate the other planets moons is silly as their orbital frequency is almost guarenteed not the be a month.

you have to call them something though, if you left it to the scientists everything would just have a catalogue number.

Does the sun, our moon, the planets in our solar system - have NGC numbers? Does the earth?

[claire1985]

Ok I admit maybe wanting to slap her round her head was a bit extreme, I'd expect my daughter to ask me that not my 25 year old sister.

I think I assume because astronomy is my passion everyone else should know these things too.

Ah well least she got of education out of it :-)

[barkis]

Ok I admit maybe wanting to slap her round her head was a bit extreme, I'd expect my daughter to ask me that not my 25 year old sister.

I think I assume because astronomy is my passion everyone else should know these things too.

Ah well least she got of education out of it :-)

Don't chide your sister whatever you do, curiosity is to be applauded, however misguided the enquirers perceptions of things may be.

The inquiring mind fuels science, so science, and knowledge in general, certainly needs the curious .

Ron.