Jim Oberg's "99 FAQs About Space UFO Videos"

[ArMaP]

Please get this to ArMaP and he can get it to me.

Check you email.

[ArMaP]

Armap has one such hand-held image I sent him, can he please post it here?

Sorry for taking so long to post the image, among other things I was looking for a new site to upload and share files, as the image is too big for the more common image sharing sites I use.

Let's see if this works.
https://app.box.com/s/k76s1qjckel2upqmynmz

[JimO]

I'll post the data charts shortly, here's my draft narrative.

The relative motion between shuttle 'Columbia' and the separated TSS-1R payload and tether during the crew's observations on Flight Day 9 [March 1, 1996] turn out to be a lot more complex than earlier simplistic reconstructions imagined.  The actual profile, now confirmed with computer simulations from two independent sources, directly bear on what was being seen, photographed,  and shown on televised scenes by the on-duty  astronaut team of Jeff Hoffman, Claude Nicollier, and Franklin Chang-Diaz.

After the tether snapped four days earlier, the satellite had been thrown into a higher, slower orbit. Columbia pulled ahead and then, over the next several days, overtook the tether from behind and below, and finally lapped it about a hundred hours after initial separation.

But the fly-under path was far from the simple directly underneath pass that observers imagined. Several factors of orbital mechanics influenced this.

Most important was the shift in the orbital plane of both satellites, but each at a different rate. This difference was due to the tether's higher altitude, where its path was affected slightly less by the gravitational torques of Earth's equatorial bulge. As a result, although 'Columbia's orbit was twisted westward at a daily rate of 7.49 degrees, the tether's rate was only 7.24, leaving an inertial orientation difference after one full lapping [four days] of 1.14 degrees. Combined with the orbital inclination [28 deg] this created a planar difference of 0.52 degrees. That difference in latitude is 52 NM, or about 100 km.

In practical terms this meant that far from passing overhead, as viewed from Columbia the tether was swinging left and right every orbit. Visualize a driver in the center lane of a three lane highway with a wild driver ahead, who is swinging from far left to far right lane and back again. Because the tether was in a higher orbit [between 20 and 110 km higher] there was no risk of collision but the left-right-left swings would still be dramatic. In orbital terms, the swing distance to either side was about 60 kilometers.

The secondary complicating factor is that the TSS-1R target was in a highly eccentric orbit. It had started out tethered 20 km above 'Columbia', at the same orbital speed. But the break threw it into a higher orbit, reaching out as far as 110 km higher. Soaring higher, its speed dropped, and then it swooped lower, regaining its initial speed – again and again and again.

As a result, back on the three-lane highway analogy, it's as if the swerving car stepped on the brake in the right lane, increasing your own overtaking rate, and then accelerated as it swerved to the left until it was almost holding its own, not appearing to fall back at all. The left-right swings continue, but the overtaking rate was quite different,  right lane versus left lane.

As a result of the actual geometry, the tether does NOT pass directly above the shuttle, but off to one side or the other.  Depending on where it is on the left-right-left swerving, it generally lurks near the straight out horizontal viewing vector [a few close passes are as high as 30 degrees] At Columbia's altitude, 'straight horizontal' is still well above the actual earth horizon, which for 290 km is 17 degrees down. So the tether is somewhat above the horizon during the observation periods, but nowhere near overhead.

Now add in the critical factor of illumination, which determines where along each swing the target satellite can actually be seen. First, for 40% of each orbit the tether is in Earth's shadow and is dark. Then, at sunrise, the tether can be seen. At sunrise, on this particular mission, the sun is about 30 degrees right of the direction of motion [this is called the orbit's "beta angle"], so viewing in that direction is difficult. And  as the target  swerves left and right, and as the sun 'rises' higher in the sky, glare effects make the dim satellite unobservable. 

Columbia's dark periods on the part of the day in question were 03:25:18 to 04:00:02 GMT, 4:55:36 to 05:30:22 GMT, 6:25:54 to 7:00:41 GMT, and 07:56:12 to 08:31:00 GMT  Several minutes after sunrise would be the best viewing opportunity.

Shuttle flight plan documents and MCC time callouts are more often in Mission Elapsed Time, or MET. To convert MET to GMT for STS-75, add 51/20:18:00, the GMT date/time of mission launch. A third time hack needed here is the tape clock time on the three hour-long hi-def tapes on youtube, to reference exact mission comments. The NASA document "STS-75 Scene List" spells out both GMT and MET, but the tape time had to be measured during actual playing of the videos.

Now for the precise angles and times for STS-75. They were calculated by two expert sources and compared to the transcript I prepared from the hours of videotapes that spanned the four observation periods of the Flight Day 09 fly-under. They used public orbital data and can be replicated and verified by anyone with public domain s/w such as the "Satellite Tool Kit". Here are the results.

Columbia had been commanded into a special observation attitude described in the FD08 update message as –ZLV, -XVV, which means  -Z  axis [body up-down] as local vertical, -X [body long axis] in the velocity vector. This put Columbia moving tail forward, payload bay pointing to space.

First observation: Sunrise was at 04:00 GMT, the tether was at near far right elongation [and greatest altitude]. Azimuth was 068 deg , range was 527 km, elevation 009 deg above horizontal [and this 026 deg above visible earth limb].Over the next ten minutes the azimuth shifted to 075, elevation rose to 014 [i.e., 031 to earth horizon], as range dropped to 402 km.

This is the period when the crew got their first look at the tether, although the video images were poor. Viewing angles out the forward left window [in the commander's seat] were already near the trailing edge, looking hard to the left from the seat. But the aft cabin windows were worse, they directly in the glare of the rising sun at azimuth 033. Over the next ten minutes the sun moved halfway up the sky [40 degrees] so the crew then also tried the aft window, without much improvement.

Columbia was out of contact during this post-sunrise period, so the exact times of the observation were not recorded. The sequence was taped and then downlinked a few minutes later [04:31 to 04:39] with crew comments.

During the following period the full daylight glare rendered the tether non-observable, it continued its swing right to left, passing above and in front of Columbia. Reaching maximum leftward swing while also its lowest altitude, it briefly kept pace with the shuttle before beginning the swing back to the right. Sunset occurred, and about ten minutes later the tether passed right in front of and above the shuttle's nose, about 85 km out, unseen in the darkness. It then continued its swing to the right and reached maximum off-angle.

Second ["swarm"] observation. Sunrise occurred at 05:30 [the tether 'rose' about a minute before Columbia due to its higher altitude], at a range of 146 km, off to the right but now slightly trailing. Near its max altitude, the tether was high in the sky as viewed by Columbia. Cameras C and D in the payload bay were in use, and it would have been clearly visible in the overhead window.

Note that for this pass the line of sight to the upper right was in the vicinity of the shuttle's water dump ports along the left side of the crew cabin [which was pointed backwards for this observation period].

During this period Columbia was passing points 002N 007W to 019N 027E.This was predawn [but sunlit in space] from the coast of Liberia to northern Sudan, continuing across Saudi Arabia, Bahrein, towards Pakistan.  It would have been bright in the predawn skies of West Africa all the way across Nigeria. The tether would have been much dimmer by comparison, but any other really large objects would have been starkly brighter a good distance away.

Third observation,  tbs

[JimO]

Spent two hours in the NASA JSC photo archives with the rolls from STS-75, found several dozen shots of the detached tether on the FD09 fly-under. Am getting digital scans of all the shots. Some 35mm images cast illuminating light on the CCTV image of the fat tether and the swarm. Will share shortly. 

[JimO]

xy plane, relative motion of tether versus shuttle
https://scontent-b-dfw.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfp1/t1.0-9/10411930_10202771444221819_2234421402603062129_n.jpg

xz plane ditto
https://scontent-b-dfw.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpf1/t1.0-9/10346389_10202771446661880_511424908157925727_n.jpg

[zorgon]

So when are you taking me with you To Biakonur for a tour Jim?

[Sgt.Rocknroll]

From Dr. Joe Resnick's FB page:





The craft being captured by infra-red cameras are vibrating at-or-near the far infra-red spectrum...which means they are not visible to the human eye...but are in extant in the human realm of existence...and observable by NASA's cameras.  The items appearing are not 'space debris'.  Space debris will not appear in the infra-red spectrum.  The luminosity is a function of decay produced by the on-board propulsion system.

[JimO]

"The craft being captured by infra-red cameras are vibrating at-or-near the far infra-red spectrum...which means they are not visible to the human eye..."

Who says the cameras are infra-red? And emitting in IR is no indication they don't also emit in visible. This is a stupid statement, who made it? Let me guess, David "King of the clueless" Sereda?? What excuse do YOU have for believing it??

[Sgt.Rocknroll]

Well big O look at the top of the thread. You can read can't you? If you don't know who he is, then there's no point in going forward.

[deuem]

Hey Sarge, I know who both of them are. I can't get Utubee so is it NASA or Sereda that says it is filmed in Infrared? If you know, can you share that info? We might have to back track flights and figure out what cameras they had on each flight. Which is not easy to do with the Shuttle. On the tether flight I know they had a special UV camera. The average camera will shot just into the IR a bit below eye sight and also a bit into UV above eye sight. Yet they do have special cameras for both spectrum's.

Here's where I think outloud. IMHO: I think that almost anything including a space ship that is running hot in UV should produce Heat and be picked up on IR. No different that consumer cameras. If something was not visible in plain light yet visible only in IR then it would be more or less pure heat.

There are some camps that say UFOs are in IR only and some say in the visible or UV only ranges. For my own work to date I like the UV/visible group. They should show up on all 3 cameras UV, Standard and IR as long as it is in UV A. Going to B or higher it would need a UV camera only.

So I don't know if a UFO could survive in pure IR. It should be very hot. And I don't know if a UV A hot object can be picked up by IR and not picked up by standard cameras or the eye if the UFO is in UV B or higher. Maybe? If would be a good test to do. Set up a UV B,C & U light and film it with IR and standard video. See if the IR or visible camera catches it. The other way around, A pure UV camera should not pick up any IR light but maybe the high end of visible.

Did any of that cross talking make sense. It got me dizzy. lol

[astr0144]

Was  Dr. Joe Resnick also suggesting it ?




Deuem

Hey Sarge, I know who both of them are. I can't get Utubee so is it NASA or Sereda that says it is filmed in Infrared? If you know, can you share that info?

Jim O

Who says the cameras are infra-red? And emitting in IR is no indication they don't also emit in visible. This is a stupid statement, who made it? Let me guess, David "King of the clueless" Sereda?? What excuse do YOU have for believing it??

[Sgt.Rocknroll]

I asked Dr. Resnick specifically this morning and this was his answer...

Joe, was this David's words or yours?

"Mine....not David's. Yes...this would account for the craft seeming appearing to become invisible.... We're all just 'frequencies'...our reality, lives, existences. When we die, the spark of energy that was within us for our lifetime is disbursed into the collective consciousness...and the substance of what we (all the collective life experiences we recognize as the self) are/were, become part of the cosmic mind...yet we hold consciousness and identity. That's what I believe."

[deuem]

Thanks Sarge.
I take it that he is in the IR group then. Where the craft are actually operating lower than IR and when they come up a bit they show up in the IR film.

The other camp is they are in high level UV B C or U and come down to visible. Like two trains on different tracks that will never meet.

In the IR camp, "I guess" they must have the UFOs down in the radio wave length of radar , TV and AM/FM Radio where no one can see and come up from there.

In UV they come down. As you can see the 2 camps are very different. Interesting.

[ArMaP]

The average camera will shot just into the IR a bit below eye sight and also a bit into UV above eye sight.

I think that only happens with digital cameras, not the older tube-based cameras, but I'm not sure about it.