Metabunk
Orbs with Dots - PDAF Focus Pixels in Sun Reflection Lens Flare
Source: (MUFON case 84702)
A variety of images reported as "UFO"zm show what looks like a glowing disk with some dots on it. These basically look like lens flares, but the dot patterns are unusual, as they vary from irregular, regular, or or semiregular patterns. However they still look very two dimensional - they don't seem to curve around the "orb". Here's a collection of similar images all claimed as "UFOs"
What we are seeing here is a reflected image of the sun with the highlighted reflections of focus pixel. ...
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Searching and Linking to MUFON cases
MUFON is a long established organization that maintains a database of "UFO" sightings which sometimes contains things we discuss here on Skydentify. Unfortunately their database system is a little fiddly to access. Often people will find cases in the "Last 20 Reports" link from the home page
https://mufoncms.com/cgi-bin/report_handler.pl?req=latest_reports
This gives you the basic info of the case, but generally the interesting stuff is in the "Long Description". You can click on this and you will get a pop-up window with the description and a direct link to the long description. For example:
https://mufoncms.com/cgi-bin/report_handler.pl?req=view_long_desc&id=82310
So people often link to the case with this "long Description" link. Unfortunately this does...
https://mufoncms.com/cgi-bin/report_handler.pl?req=latest_reports
This gives you the basic info of the case, but generally the interesting stuff is in the "Long Description". You can click on this and you will get a pop-up window with the description and a direct link to the long description. For example:
https://mufoncms.com/cgi-bin/report_handler.pl?req=view_long_desc&id=82310
So people often link to the case with this "long Description" link. Unfortunately this does...
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Quantifying Expert Consensus Against Covert Geoengineering / Chemtrails
In a paper publish in Environmental Research letters, August 2016, 77 scientists with expertise in atmospheric science and geochemistry were asked to give their expert opinions regarding the most common claims of evidence put forward by proponents of the "chemtrail" or "covert geoengineering" theory (referred to in the paper as a "secret large-scale atmospheric program (SLAP)". The evidence being photos of trails left by planes, and chemical analyses of air, soil, and water. The scientists overwhelming rejected the idea that the photos and tests were evidence of a secret spraying program. All of the atmospheric scientists and all but one of the geochemists saw nothing suspicious about the proffered evidence. The photos were all identified as contrails, and the...
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Floating Cities are Generally not Fata Morgana Mirages
A video is being widely shared on social media (and the "weird news" sections of more traditional media) claiming to show the image of an impossibly large city rising above the fog in the city of Foshan (佛山), Guangdong province, China
Here's a composite image of the Foshan video
Notice the scale of things here, there are what looks like two construction cranes on the "horizon" to the left, and the buildings seem to loom high into the sky above them.
Some have said this is...
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Debunked: UFO over Loch Ness [Reflection in Dual Pane Window]
A recent photo proports to show a UFO over Loch Ness in Scotland, however it's
UPDATE July 10, 2015:
I contacted the owner of the cottage, who graciously agreed to take a few photos and a short video from the same location. These prove conclusively that the "UFO" is simply the reflection of a light in the window:
You can see the reflection of the curtain in the window, just like with the "UFO" photo, which demonstrates that the UFO photo was taken...
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Debunked: Public Law 105-85 Allowing Testing of Biological and Chemical Weapons [It's the Opposite]
Public Law 105-85 (U.S. Code Title 50, Chapter 32, § 1520a) came into effect in 1997. It makes it illegal for the military to test biological and chemical weapons on people, and also makes it illegal to conduct peaceful experiments on people without their informed consent. It reads:
External Quote:
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Solved: Strange Beam of Light over Mayan Temple and Florida [Lightning + Rolling Shutter Artifact]
The above images are examples of a rolling shutter artifact. A "rolling shutter" means that the image is recorded one row (or column in portrait orientation) at a time, and not simultaneously. This means if the exposure and the flash are of very short duration, then the flash will only illuminate some pixel rows (or columns) of the image. Slowed down it looks a bit like this:
The green rectangle is the rolling shutter window - what the camera sees of the scene at any one time, and it builds up the actual photo by reading from this rectangle. The flash of lighting is very short, but still lights up all the pixels in the rolling shutter window, causing the "beam".
Here's what's going on...
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