Green Sirius!!!!

[Paul73]

Hi Folks

Whilst observing last night, I saw something that I can't explain.

About 2am Sirius turned bright green! Other stars in that part of the sky may have had a slight tinge but not conclusive. Other parts of the sky looked normal. This lasted about a minute. 

I was relatively sober and free from mind altering narcotics.

Has anyone seen anything similar? Or, have a sensible explainaton?

Paul

 

[MARS1960]

My best guess, its something to do with the atmosphere,  it is often called the rainbow star.

[Thalestris24]

I saw (or thought I saw) Betelgeuse flare brilliant red momentarily the other night. Not sure if I imagined it or not but it seemed real.

Louise

[xtreemchaos]

Aliens dumping waste, that's why it twinkles so much  na ill go with Marks idea. clear skys, charl. ps it could be something to do with the northern lights.

[Dave In Vermont]

Sirius, from my latitude of 44.28N, sparkles brilliantly in red, yellow, blue, and purple - but never green. As I don't believe the sparkles are caused by ET emptying the trash (), rather by refraction through the atmosphere at it's angle of sight, I'm sure the green you saw was also a product of this - but 'green?' It must have had some other factor rolled into this..... I note there's another thread around here reporting a sighting of the 'green-flash' over land somewhere in England quite recently.

I'd go look for the 'green-flash' thread and contact the reporter in that one. By way of some comparisons in date, time, topography, etc. - perhaps the mystery of the 'Green Sirius' can be explained - or not!

Worth a shout, for sure. Thanks for the report, Paul!

Dave

[estwing]

northern lights?

[Paul73]

Thanks form the thoughts guys.

I am used to "Rainbow Stars" when viewing low down. But, this was higher, naked eye and a constant steady green.

A weak Aurora might be the answer. But,at 51°, I would be surprised. But, not impossible.....

Strange that nobody else spotted it. Judging by the number of splendid obverving reports from the other night, there were loads of folks out with their scopes. 

Paul

[alan potts]

I think I would go with Calvin's northern lights or maybe a con trail from an aircraft.

Alan

[Paul73]

4 hours ago, alan potts said:

I think I would go with Calvin's northern lights or maybe a con trail from an aircraft.

Alan

Yes. A very weak aurora might well be the solution. The aurora band forecasts were dipping south and showing highish likelihood for the last couple of days. But, the raw solar wind / density data is showing as increasing strongly after the event rather than before. So I'll celebrate a 'tentative' Aurora sighting from rural West Berkshire (51° N - same as London / Calgary, Alb).....

The green flash can be discounted as it wasn't a flash (can't seem to find Dave's thread, but am assuming that this is sun related).

Paul

[alan potts]

3 minutes ago, Paul73 said:

Yes. A very weak aurora might well be the solution. The aurora band forecasts were dipping south and showing highish likelihood for the last couple of days. But, the raw solar wind / density data is showing as increasing strongly after the event rather than before. So I'll celebrate a 'tentative' Aurora sighting from rural West Berkshire (51° N - same as London / Calgary, Alb).....

The green flash can be discounted as it wasn't a flash (can't seem to find Dave's thread, but am assuming that this is sun related).

Paul

It is something I have never seen and I don't see much chance of ever seeing it from here.

alan

[Paul73]

21 minutes ago, alan potts said:

It is something I have never seen and I don't see much chance of ever seeing it from here.

alan

I wouldn't have known it was there if Sirius hadn't turned green. 

So not exactly the fantastic folds of eerie light the you might hope for!☹️

Still it was an interesting phenomenon.

Paul

[Pete Presland]

Venus certainly does show plenty of different colours, including green as shown in this image I took a while back.

[Paul73]

Great picture Pete. I guess that there will be every colour in the rainbow! You often get the rainbow effect when viewing low down in turbulent air. But, have never seen it used to etch shapes (this could be a whole new line in Astro art). My observation was naked eye. Have seen plenty of red/orange colour exegerations. But, never green or a complete change of star colour!

Paul

[bejay1957]

11 hours ago, Paul73 said:

Thanks form the thoughts guys.

I am used to "Rainbow Stars" when viewing low down. But, this was higher, naked eye and a constant steady green.

A weak Aurora might be the answer. But,at 51°, I would be surprised. But, not impossible.....

Strange that nobody else spotted it. Judging by the number of splendid obverving reports from the other night, there were loads of folks out with their scopes. 

Paul

If it wasn't seen over wide area, and given its short duration then an anomaly that was probably quite localized from your perspective, perhaps low-level smoke or similar drifting across the star from your viewpoint?   Given the forecasts that night, I would have thought auroral display near the southern horizon was unlikely - only seen that once here in the Thames Valley, during the auroral/geomagnetic storm during the night of 6/7 April 2000.

[JOC]

Last night and tonight Sirius was flashing all sorts of colours.  In fact last night we hadn't looked it up and my son named it the 'raving party star'.  Through our atmosphere (cold and crisp) it looked to be flashing red, blue, yellow and fluctuated in apparent size.  Last night it was so psychedelic we weren't even convinced it was a natural  object.