Starship Asterisk*

To me, it looks like some kind of flying object that was traveling super fast and was about to fly into the water. It looks to be on an angle sorta like / with the body of the object in the center and each wing having some sort of capsule on the end, perhaps for fuel like modern lear jets. The flash appears to be "fire" from the propulsion system of the object and the trail could be a smoke trail or some kind of warp in the atmosphere as the object flew by. Perhaps it was water vapor being condensed by high pressure and it quickly vaporized milliseconds later, explaining why the streak is not in the next piture. The next question is why there wasn't a huge splash in the water! So, either the object has tremendous manuverability or some type of "cloaking" device that allows it to travel through matter. For our technology, this seems impossible, but since matter is mostly made up of nothing--just space between tiny tiny tiny particles--perhaps some advanced civilization has the ability to move through matter without destroying or altering it. Perhaps the light doesn't work because it was affected in some way by the object traveling through it. If you think this is way out there, realize that in the time it took you to read this, billions of nutrinos passed through you body. Did you feel anything?

slammy102 wrote:I saw this numerous times when I was living in canada - I looked at the closely, and it seemed that they were on flight paths. I watched numerous planes going along these strange streaks.

But did they appear and then disappear in just a few seconds?

This is an exploding light bulb, accidentally captured.

The streak is an artefact or FAKE (the line looks too artificial).

Simple and logical solution.

Anybody that saw the "V" mini-series that was on TV back in the '80s knows that this is simply a shot fired from one of the visitor's ships.

As for the diagonal dark line, I can see a virtually identical one out my window at this instant (2:04 pm 12/7/04). What I'm seeing is the shadow of a jet contrail - I can see both the contrail and its shadow. The angle in very nearly the same, as is its contrast against the background sky. The cloud conditions are otherwise fairly similar to those see in the APOD photo. As for the flash at the bottom of the trail, its coincidental location with the top of a light pole suggests a reflection off the glass in the light. Of course, it might be a distortion in the space-time continuum caused by an incipient invasion of beings from another universe, or maybe, just a reflection off the glass in the light.

As for the diagonal dark line, I can see a virtually identical one out my window at this instant (2:04 pm 12/7/04). What I'm seeing is the shadow of a jet contrail - I can see both the contrail and its shadow. The angle in very nearly the same, as is its contrast against the background sky. The cloud conditions are otherwise fairly similar to those see in the APOD photo. As for the flash at the bottom of the trail, its coincidental location with the top of a light pole suggests a reflection off the glass in the light. Of course, it might be a distortion in the space-time continuum caused by an incipient invasion of beings from another universe, or maybe, just a reflection off the glass in the light.

Contrails of commercial aircraft would be produced at about 36.000 feet, well above could base. In the image the dark streak is in the foreground, under the cloudbase, and extends to the horizon. Also there is no perspective effect - ie the line stays pretty much the same thickness and darkness, rather than getting less pronounced towards the horizon.

With the sun behind you and a contrail passing in front of it, the shadow of the contrial should appear as an anticrepuscular line in front of you. This appears to be the case with this photo.

Assuming that this is a film transparency, I suggest that you have a processing streak in that frame, probably from a particulate contaminate in the tank tracing across the emulsion. Further, I suggest that the particle settled into the wet emulsion (which is a soft at this point, a form of gelatin) and caused a pit of sorts that appears as light being transmitted through the slide.

ALIENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

Okay - after almost everyone said something to that apod I also want to post images with a similar effect.

It was this January when I went by train trough Germany (near Frankfurt/Main) very early in the morning when the sun just rises. This was the 31. May 2003 when there a sun eclipse - I don't know if this has something to do with this effect.

On the images are lines which are similar to the line on the APOD image, I suppose. Perhaps the line is seperated from the "bulb-explosion" and the line is perhaps explainable with the same effect which caused the lines on the both images below? These lines were very long visible (about 10 mins) but on the apod image the clouds may cause only a very short shadow or whatever it is...?

http://files.fips-schneider.de/images/bild_07.jpg
http://files.fips-schneider.de/images/bild_08.jpg

Greetings from Wiesbaden, Germany


Philipp Schneider

I live in a remote area of southwestern South Dakota and have seen these. I also believe they are related to jet contrails - the times I've seen them are when the sun is slanting in the late afternoon.

If the photo is enlarged there is a flash line all across the water.

Well, I'm no scientist, but reading the other posts gave me the idea that the following MAY be true.

Suppose that the light bulb DID blow at the moment of the photograph being snapped. I would venture to say that, given the smoke surrounding it, the light bulb did shatter, and that the arc caused by the destruction of the bulb case a bright light in all directions....except the direction blocked by the pole...which caused the shadow to be visible in the hazy, humid air. A simple way to test this theory is to have, on a similarly misty day, a photographer hold a portable flash directly under the (now replaced) light bulb and see if a similar shadow is cast upon execution of the flash.

Just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Lou

Could it be a lump of ice (or some other object) falling from a passing aircraft?

The 'flash' could be a splash, i.e. some object hitting the water behind the light post.

I've spent a long time looking at these shots, the differences between them, and the time, location, and angle of the images. Assuming that the time was correctly set in the camera, these were taken at UT 09:22:52 (plus/minus 15 seconds), which is right at sunset in Darwin. The Sun was barely below the horizon, at an azimuth of 249. The camera was facing a little east of south. So the Sun was setting approximately at right angles to the line of sight, to the right in the images, which is also supported by the lighting on the clouds.

What I physically observe is that the shadow extends fully to the left of the frame, and is not quite in line with the flash. The shadow is very straight, but not of uniform width over its length. The flash does not appear to be coincident with the luminaire.

This is not a meteor, nor any other physical object traveling at the distance of the wharf. An object at that distance, with such a straight, non-vertical trajectory, would be moving so fast that the atmospheric effects and the kinetics of the termination would have been widely observed. Although it strongly resembles a contrail shadow, I think the angle between the camera, shadow, and Sun argues against it (these shadows show up when the contrail, Sun, and observer are nearly in line with each other). The flash may be reflected sunlight (the color is right), but I think the Sun has probably already set, and it seems far too bright for a reflection from that distance. Note that nothing in the images appears to be sunlit except for the high clouds.

I think that the best explanation for this is something passing a few centimeters in front of the lens. An insect is the most obvious choice. The speed would be about right for the 50mS exposure; you would expect it to appear dark against the sky, and out of focus. It was probably carried mainly by the wind, which explains why the path is quite straight over several centimeters. The variation in the width of the line is explained by the local movement of the insect. The flash at the end, and the "smoke" is simply the bug caught in the flash of the camera. I've caught shapes like this on allsky cameras, caused by birds flying close to the camera.

The line is probably a shadow, much like an inverse spotlight, caused by something small in front of the fireball seen in the photo, which is creating a bright light source. Possibly it is a round skyrocket fuselage momentarily blocking the light created as it detonates. It may be a lamp arcing creating the light, but the poles do not seem to be where the fireball is, so I think it's fireworks lauched from the ship.

I believe we have 2 things going on here. BUT we need to know where the sun was, to support teh contrail Idea. I too have seen contrails several times that look just like this. I think we have a coincedence of a contrail aligned just as a lamp burned out.

The bright area is an internal refection inside the cameras lens system, it's a lens flare. It's not in the scene, otherwise it would reflect in the water. Ok, I can see a second possible lens flare in the water at the 4.30pm position from the first.

The lens flare has a bluish tint of a single layer anti-reflection coating, whist the yellowish colour maybe uncoated glass. Most likely it is a spurious reflection caused by a light source just outside the field of view, to the upper left, the dark lane points towards it. The light source could be a white sea bird (Or moth) that flapped by just at the right time.

I'm sure I saw something like this before, but I cant remember where.

Oh I remember! The dark lane is a un-illuminated sea bird reflecting in the camera's lens system, the white lens flare of the bird is caused when the camera's flash went off illuminating the bird. A lens iris, in this scene would be open for 0.25 to 0.5 of a second. At the end of the exposure, the flash goes off illuminating the bird. A camera's flash only last 1/10,000 sec, thus the bird is sharp and in focus and acts as light source. There are some lights already on in the harbor, so the scene was not that intrinsically bright.

Alternatively, it is a double exposure with SpaceShipOne

http://www.hobbyspace.com/AAdmin/Images ... _cmp30.jpg

Diamond Dave

I don't buy the bug explaination since it doesn't seen likely that camera flash would only reflect from a small part of the bug.

After downloading the images from APOD, and carefully examining/ manipulating them, there are a couple things worth mention.

Most notably is the "V" shaped area of increased luminance with an apex down below the lamp post. There is also a "bright streak" which appears to originate from the same source.

The notable features of the "meteor strike" image can be explained with a bright flash located near the base of the lamp post and hidden from direct view of the camera.

It was probably quite hazy when the photos were taken. The "V' shaped area of increased luminance, and the brightness streak, are caused by the light source directly illuminating the haze in the air. This is similar to the way approaching headlight beams appear at night.

The "impact flash" is the true light source reflecting off the lamp glass.

The "meteor tube" is the shadow of the light fixture (illuminated by the true light source) projected into the haze.

The round area of increased luminance, seemingly attached to the "bright streak" is most likely lens flare, from the reflection of the true flash, since it's "darker" in the middle of the round area.

Doug Kniffen

I read the sibling discussion on this topic at slashdot and I'm now convinced it must be a jet contrail.

"photoshopped image... (Score:5, Informative)
by zebruh (838101) on Tuesday December 07, @11:37AM (#11019466)

Maybe this will shed some light. It's a Photoshop "difference" between the before image and the mystery image, with a bit of levels adjustment to make it more obvious.
http://img119.exs.cx/my.php?loc=img119& ... ebigdi.jpg "

The camera must have been placed with a sheet of glass in front of it, and a fighter jet must have passed low overhead with its afterburner turned on. This would produce a contrail of black smoke. The jet must have been flying at an angle where it would be reflected in the glass in front of the camera, but not have been directly in the field of view,

I find it plausible that the camera would have been placed with some sort of protecion from wind and rain, as it was making a time lapse recording of the clouds.

The contrail shadow theory doesn't hold water (pun intended) since it would have to be at least the thickness of contrail causing it -- yards across if not larger. Also the dispersion of the shadow effect caused by the sun would make it extremely difficult to see so clearly, unless, of course, the dark line is actually miles in the air and just coincidently lined up with the lamp post. The lightning theory is curious given that the light post is not nearly the tallest of the available exits for the bolt's energy. The white "smoke" looks to me, a photographer, like a piece of lint on the lens, but if it wasn't there 20 seconds before or after, then that wouldn't be the answer.
An enigma, apparently, and without more input or data, it seems likely to remain that way.

I am not sure what it is exactly either...but I saw something very similar to this about 2 weeks ago while in Tennessee. I stared at it for a while and the only thing I could determine it was....it had something to do with the position of the Sun as well as somthing in between the Sun and the Earth at that point in time. As for this object, I am proposing the same theory...however, the glare on the water is merely that, I do not suspect any lasers or UFO's. It just so happens that the crest of the wave happened to be catching a window of sun between clouds and lining up with that streak. Sorry, not too scientific, but much easier to swallow.