What was I just observing?

[pbennett87]

Ok, I am new here, my Dad gave me his telescope at weekend because he has upgraded to something all singing all dancing, tonight was fairly clear and not too cold, managed to spot 2 slow moving space objects meteors/shooting stars/something else? (I don't know what the professionals like to call them, haha!) with the naked eye... Anyway, I managed to lock on to a star/planet whatever it may be, obviously for a newbie with Stellarium and Google Sky at my disposal I managed to get a reference point (star) with a direct trajectory from Mizar through Alkaid to give me a boundry, whilst outside Google Sky lead me to believe it was M3? However I am not sure at all in terms of distance, I can say however it was a fairly bright star to the naked eye. Please find attached an image which may help you understand more...

Thanks in advance!

[pbennett87]

The red area is where I think the star was located, think being the operative word

[Carl Reade]

Well if its a slow steady moving object its highly likely to be a satellite or a piece of space junk. A shooting star will streak across the sky in a second and burn up.

Hope this helps.

Carl

[TomOb2603]

I live in runcorn (north-west uk) i seen something around 22:00 heading north (ish) that kept getting very bright then would go dim, then bright again, couldn't get hold of anything to have a good look at it, but I'm guessing it was a satellite, may of been the same thing.

[kerrylewis]

If it is a comparatively slowing moving object it is almost certainly a satellite. If it changes in brightness that about clinches it. Many satellites tumble or rotate reflecting the sun differently as they do. The most well known are the Iridium series which can flare very brightly. The International Space Station (ISS) is also very bright but steady. It is visible for an few days at a time moving from west to east sometimes almost overhead.

There is a very useful website called Heavens Above where you can enter your latitude and longitude and get accurate predictions of visible satellites, including Iridium flares. There are also some apps available if you have a smartphone or IPad.

I've been fascinated by satellites since I was a teenager in the 60s. A government department (can't remember the name) would send you prediction material in the post (no computers then) in return for your observations. The brightest satellites then were the Echo series which were actually aluminium covered balloons.

i hope that helps.

[kerrylewis]

I remembered . The place sending out the data was called COSPAR standing for Committee on Space Research (according to Wikipedia) Perhaps not a government department but the large brown envelopes came On Her Majesty's Service. The postman must have wondered....

[Pyrodave]

Stellarium has a button to turn on satellite hints,This shows the trajectory of them.If you go back to the time you were observing it will show you which satellites were in the area

[Ben_Jim]

Nice to see you have had your first light, Peter, you will be wanting bigger and better things now! Sadly I will be keeping this one for a while lol

Jim