Claim: UFO seen from observatory in Oman in 2017

[MonkeeSage]

I didn't find any previous discussion on this, so apologies if this has already been discussed. A video claimed to be from an astronomical observatory in Oman, taken in 2017, shows a UFO silhouetted against a full moon. We do not have information on the date of recording, precise location, or equipment used and this is very much Low Information Zone (LIZ).



This has been reported by the secureteam10 youtube channel.


Source: https://youtu.be/A27HfnrHvFA?t=50


Original video from Instagram attached here (see below for link to source).

Several claims made by secureteam10 in relation to this footage seem to be factually incorrect.

secureteam10 video 01:22 -

What we know about this footage so far is that it was originally posted by a Middle Eastern, Arabic-speaking news outlet which you're seeing here [the Instagram page is shown]. And it was posted on Instagram by something called "3meed_news", so it's on Instagram here, I'll link it. And then it was posted by another Instagram account called "white_lion_1991" which seems to be another Arabic-speaking Instagram page.

Content from External Source

The "3meed_news" Instagram account/post was never actually provided by secureteam10 in the video description or comments as far as I can tell, but I found the post shown in the video.


Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BS6uiVBDHPN


Based on a machine translation of the post, they credit Shihab Al-Shandoudi with the video, which is the "white_lion_1991" account they tag in the comment to the post.



So they did not post the video first, and the original post was by Mr. Al-Shandoudi on the "white_lion_1991" account here.


Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BS6iJK_g2Yu


Machine translation of the comment on the post.

A strange body appeared while I was photographing the super moon, and I did not know what this thing was?! We see! Words: the appearance of a foreign object while filming the moon, I did not know what this thing was

Content from External Source

secureteam10 video 01:49 -

The viewer who sent this informed me that this was seen and recorded in the Middle East, precisely in Oman, and was filmed at the Alokeen [Note: I am just phonetically spelling what I hear] Astronomical Observatory. [...] So we obviously have a very high powered telescope here.

Content from External Source

This appears to be a conflation with the quote from an astronomer from the Al-Hawqain / Al-Hawqayn Astronomical Observatory regarding ISS lunar transit duration as seen in the "3meed_news" post, and appears to be unrelated to the video captured by Mr. Al-Shandoudi. I haven't been able to find any information on Al-Hawqain observatory, the only observatory in Oman registered with the IAU being C97 Al-Fulaij Observatory, but again it seems immaterial since there is no indication that Mr. Al-Shandoudi captured the video there or using their equipment.


With the factual inaccuracies out of the way, moving on to discuss identification of the object.

The object appears to have a long, wispy "tail" and a bright "head". It appears to move slowly across the frame and to have a mostly horizontal motion relative to the camera. The motion appears to be around 45° perpendicular to the angle of the object--i.e., the object is moving left to right across the frame while the object is "pointed" towards the top right. Also the bright spot on the "head" seems like it might just be a hole/lack of something there and not illuminated itself, because it looks like you can see through it to space when the object reaches the edge of the moon, although it's hard to tell for sure.



In some frames it almost looks like two contrails/exhaust plumes created by something in front.




The general possibilities I can think of are:

- Hoax
- Airplane
- Rocket
- Comet
- Kite / Balloon
- Some random debris / a seed / etc
- Experimental government or research aircraft
- ET aircraft (or a giant ET)


Estimating time, location and equipment.

Mr. Al-Shandoudi posted the video to Instagram on April 15th, 2017 with the location being Muscat, Oman. So while we do not have the precise location, the general location seems to be established. Looking at a lunar calendar for April 2017, the last full moons prior to the upload occurred from the 9th to the 12th, with the 10th being the largest.

https://phasesmoon.com/oman/mascat/mooncalendar2017April.html

Mooncalc shows the moon would have been visible from Muscat on April 10th 2017 rising to the East, proceeding South relatively high in the sky (63° at zenith), and setting in the West.

https://www.mooncalc.org/#/23.5762,58.583,10/2017.04.10/19:00/1/3

Comparing the level of detail and magnification in Mr. Al-Shandoudi's video with other videos from even relatively small consumer-grade telescopes, I believe he was filming with a telephoto lens and not a telescope. His Instagram profile description lists him as a photographer which would be consistent with using a telephoto lens.


This is already making several assumptions because we are in the LIZ, but can we come up with any potential candidates based on these (or other) assumptions?

- Hoax

The object appears to be shimmering along with the moon due to the atmosphere, Mr. Al-Shandoudi does not appear to have tried to capitalize on this as ET/UFO, and his Instagram posts do no appear to reference anything else ET/UFO related, so I would rank hoax pretty low without further indicators.


- Plane

The secureteam10 video shows a video of an airliner transiting a full moon shot with a telephoto lens and rules out a plan because of how large the plane looks in the video.



However, I have found several different clips on youtube of planes transiting a full moon and the size and shape is all over the place, from looking very small to appearing half as large as the moon. I expect the size of the plane, the altitude of the plane, heading of the plane relative to the camera, angle of elevation to the plane/moon, distance to the plane, and the type of lens being used would all directly contribute to the angular size of the plane against the moon.

Here is an example of a plane appearing somewhat small as it transits a full moon.


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4hYzLXJDZA


However, based on the motion of the object relative the potential contrail or engine exhaust I can't work out how a plane appear like the object in Mr. Al-Shandoudi's video.


- Rocket

The shape of the "tail" immediately reminded be of the distinctive shape of the Chinese Long March rocket exhaust plume.



And there was in fact a launch of a Long March 3B rocket in the early morning of April 12th, 2017.

https://www.spacelaunchschedule.com/launch/long-march-3b-shijian-13-chinasat-16/

However, CASC does not release trajectory information so I am not sure if it would appear to transit the moon from Muscat.

The angle of the potential exhaust plume relative to the motion again puts me off thinking it's a rocket.


- Comet

The 41P/Tuttle–Giacobini–Kresák periodic comet was visible in April of 2017.

https://astronomynow.com/2017/04/02/see-a-trio-of-comets-in-the-april-sky/

Stellarium shows it would have been visible from Muscat on April 10th 2017, however it would have been on the other side of the sky and would not have transited the moon.

The comet FU158 might have been visible from Muscat on the same date but I am not smart enough to work out if it would have transited the moon as seen from Muscat. Here's the data from that date as it would be seen from the C97 Al-Fulaij Observatory in Oman.

https://newton.spacedys.com/neodys/...=2017&m1=4&d1=10&h1=23&mi1=59&ti=24&tiu=hours

But again I am thrown off by the angle of the potential comet tail versus the perceived motion of the object.


- Kite / Balloon

There was a hoaxed image a few years ago purporting to show a creature hovering over a mall in Zambia, which turned out to be a custom "Spirit Man" kite that had been photoshopped in to an image of the mall. The kites are bascally human shaped with wispy limbs.

https://factcheck.afp.com/image-has-been-edited-include-photo-kite-designed-uk-based-artist

And here is a video of kites with wispy tassels / fabric.


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGIh-tOZj4E


The angle of object relative to the motion fits much better with a kite drifting sideways on the wind, however the atmospheric distortion make me think this object is at a much higher altitude than a kite would be, and we do not see much motion in the "tail" from wind as seen in the video above.

I was thinking it kind of looks like a partially-deflated high altitude balloon, which would also fit with the angle and drifting on the wind, but as I understand it when those balloons burst they are pretty much shredded to bits and would not still look like a whole balloon. I'm not sure if there is any precedent for a balloon like that to leak or fail at a high altitude, but not completely burst, and be carried back down on the wind.




- Some random debris / a seed / etc

The atmospheric distortion again makes me think the object is at a much higher altitude.


- Experimental government or research aircraft

I am not aware of any similar looking craft that would fit the motion and angle of the object, but I suppose I would not be.


- ET aircraft (or a giant ET)

If the ET are actually giant Dementors flying in front of the moon we may have bigger problems than Mr. Grusch has recently claimed! I don't see anything in the video to indicate anything that would require advanced technology, or even really to indicate controlled flight.


I am currently leaning toward Plane/Rocket/Comet with the perceived angle of the "tail" relative to the horizontal motion possibly just being an illusion caused by perspective, although my brain isn't coming up with exactly how that would work out.

 

[flarkey]

It looks exactly like a contrailing aeroplane would look when silhouetted against the moon. I don't even think this needs any more debate. Unfortunately the sighting is too old to check ADSB records to identify the exact plane and flight number, but we could probable workout the flightpath and direction if we think that is necessary and we have the location, date and time of the video.

 

[Ann K]

However, based on the motion of the object relative the potential contrail or engine exhaust I can't work out how a plane appear like the object in Mr. Al-Shandoudi's video.

(This may be all wrong, so I'm sure you'll let me know, but here's my take on it.) It's a telescope set up to photograph the moon, and it is doing an automatic pan to keep the moon in focus as it moves. The moon and telescope are slowly moving right to left, so the object in front of it only appears to be moving left to right. Am I right? But I can't understand why there'd be that dark line on the left, which, although just briefly shown, seems to be moving the wrong way in that scenario.

 

[Mendel]

It's a telescope set up to photograph the moon, and it is doing an automatic pan to keep the moon in focus as it moves. The moon and telescope are slowly moving right to left, so the object in front of it only appears to be moving left to right. Am I right?

The moon appears to move at ~373⁰ per day because of its orbit and Earth's rotation. This comes to 0.13⁰ in 30 seconds. A supermoon's disc is ~0.55⁰ big. Therefore, we'd expect the moon to appear to move at a little less than 1/4 of its diameter during the course of a 30-second recording. This is approximately how far the aircraft appears to move. You are right.

The aircraft is very small, very far away, and the moon looks yellow-ish, so I assume this was shot at a low elevation angle, possibly shortly after moonrise. When the aircraft is far away, it appears to move slowly, due to perspective. An airliner at 500 knots moves ~250m/s. A widebody aircraft had a length of 46-76m, so it would move approximately 4 times its own length in 1 second, or 120 times its own length in 30 seconds. This is true regardless of perspective. Given that the aircraft appears very small, this would not be very far. (Also, the aircraft motion is overlaid with the apparent motion of the moon.)

But I can't understand why there'd be that dark line on the left, which, although just briefly shown, seems to be moving the wrong way in that scenario.

It might be part of the camera setup, e.g. a dangling camera strap.

 

[Alien Chess Fiend]

It looks like the flashing aircraft light is visible at the end when it's against the dark background. (In the "Original video from Instagram attached here" in the OP).

 

[MonkeeSage]

The moon appears to move at ~373⁰ per day because of its orbit and Earth's rotation. This comes to 0.13⁰ in 30 seconds. A supermoon's disc is ~0.55⁰ big. Therefore, we'd expect the moon to appear to move at a little less than 1/4 of its diameter during the course of a 30-second recording. This is approximately how far the aircraft appears to move. You are right.

The aircraft is very small, very far away, and the moon looks yellow-ish, so I assume this was shot at a low elevation angle, possibly shortly after moonrise. When the aircraft is far away, it appears to move slowly, due to perspective. An airliner at 500 knots moves ~250m/s. A widebody aircraft had a length of 46-76m, so it would move approximately 4 times its own length in 1 second, or 120 times its own length in 30 seconds. This is true regardless of perspective. Given that the aircraft appears very small, this would not be very far. (Also, the aircraft motion is overlaid with the apparent motion of the moon.)

Oh nice. I really like the idea of an equatorial mount tracking the moon! If the heading of the plane is almost directly away from the camera it would also decrease how far "up" the moon it appears to move while the tracking would account for the apparent sideways motion. I think @Ann K wins.

 

[Eburacum]

If the heading of the plane is almost directly away from the camera it would also decrease how far "up" the moon it appears to move

I suspect this plane is moving towards the camera, unless it is both travelling away from the camera and gaining height (which is feasible, but somewhat less likely). Assuming the plane is in level flight (as most planes are for most of their journey, the fact that the contrail is underneath the plane suggests strongly that the plane is approaching.

The general possibilities I can think of are:
(snip)
- Comet

Comets do not look like that. A comet's halo would be far larger than the moon, and if a comet ever came between the Moon and the Earth every astronomer would be dancing for joy.

 

[MyMatesBrainwashed]

In some frames it almost looks like two contrails/exhaust plumes created by something in front.

Not "almost".

It looks EXACTLY like a plane leaving two contrails.

 

[Mendel]

I suspect this plane is moving towards the camera, unless it is both travelling away from the camera and gaining height (which is feasible, but somewhat less likely). Assuming the plane is in level flight (as most planes are for most of their journey, the fact that the contrail is underneath the plane suggests strongly that the plane is approaching.

Or the camera is tilted.

 

[Ann K]

I've had a hard time finding observatories in Oman, but someone named Yousef Zahir al Salmi established one at Wadi Al Hoqain (presumably on one of the surrounding peaks), which is +/- 15 miles to the southwest of Rustaq airport. https://www.muscatdaily.com/2020/10/25/omani-sets-up-astronomical-observatory-in-south-batinah/

 

[JMartJr]

Personal experience with many sorts of kites rules that explanation out for me. That is of course subjective, but note that the number of the "tails" changes as one contrails seems to divide, and the tails do not ripple and flutter. I am extremely confident that it is not a kite.

MonkeeSage's video of twin-tailed delta kites (those particular kites are called "ghost deltas" or sometimes "pyro deltas" for the rippling flame-like appearance) shows well how such a kite would look in flight, and does not ressemble the object in the video at all.

And here is a video of kites with wispy tassels / fabric.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGIh-tOZj4E

On the other hand, it exactly resembles a plane leaving contrails.

Edit: fixed typo that obscured meaning in discussion of pyro deltas)

 

[FatPhil]

(This may be all wrong, so I'm sure you'll let me know, but here's my take on it.) It's a telescope set up to photograph the moon, and it is doing an automatic pan to keep the moon in focus as it moves. The moon and telescope are slowly moving right to left, so the object in front of it only appears to be moving left to right. Am I right? But I can't understand why there'd be that dark line on the left, which, although just briefly shown, seems to be moving the wrong way in that scenario.

The first thing that went through my mind upon seeing the start of that was that it was bird-poop on a window. Remembering the speed the moon moved at whilst taking some of my own full moon photos a couple of years back, the whole clip was screaming "stationary and fairly near" to me. Bird poop on a window would be stationary, of course. The dark line is *very* near, it's so out of focus. Because you're normally not rotating about a point in the focal plane, some parallax between the very near and fairly near isn't unexpected (that's more precise than it is accurate - basically in order to avoid the parallax, you'd have to have everything "just right", which would be unlikely by luck).

 

[FatPhil]

Or the camera is tilted.

Definitely the case, north is at somewhere towards 10 o'clock in that footage, if I remember my mares.

 

[MonkeeSage]

It looks like the flashing aircraft light is visible at the end when it's against the dark background. (In the "Original video from Instagram attached here" in the OP).

Excellent catch. We get a flash just after it is in darkness that looks like a plane strobe light.



Edit: And a second flash, ~one second later.



Which is keeping with FAA regulations for flashing frequency:

The arrangement of the system [...] must give an effective flash frequency of not less than 40, nor more than 100 cycles per minute.

Content from External Source

Source: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-...ubject-group-ECFR0cb7970b9d1fd5f#p-25.1401(c)

 

[Ann K]

The first thing that went through my mind upon seeing the start of that was that it was bird-poop on a window.

That was my first thought too! But then I thought "Oh no, they'll just laugh me out of here".

 

[FatPhil]

That was my first thought too! But then I thought "Oh no, they'll just laugh me out of here".

If I see it, I say it, let the joke be on me. I'm happy to be persuaded otherwise. I live pretty close to an international airport, heck, I grew up pretty close to Heathrow, I've seen a lot of contrails, and I just don't like the amount by which those streaks flair out, in particular if the aircraft is coming towards us. I agree that the lack of focus I was attributing to closeness could easily be lack of clearly due to them not having hard edges, so I'm not completely entrenched in the poop.

 

[Mendel]

Excellent catch. We get a flash just after it is in darkness that looks like a plane strobe light.
Edit: And a second flash, ~one second later.
Which is keeping with FAA regulations for flashing frequency:

Compare your excellent OP:

The general possibilities I can think of are:

- Hoax
- Airplane
- Rocket
- Comet
- Kite / Balloon
- Some random debris / a seed / etc
- Experimental government or research aircraft
- ET aircraft (or a giant ET)

The flashing light and contrail cuts these options down to a jet aircraft.

An extraterrestrial craft perfectly masquerading as a jet aircraft would've caught the attention of air traffic control.

 

[JMartJr]

I'm happy to be persuaded otherwise. I live pretty close to an international airport, heck, I grew up pretty close to Heathrow, I've seen a lot of contrails, and I just don't like the amount by which those streaks flair out, in particular if the aircraft is coming towards us.

I interpreted it as climbing away, largely on account of the flaring contrails. Upon reflection, that looks like a pretty dang steep climb, though, unless the moon is pretty low to the horizon. I am now having trouble visualizing the angle and accounting for the spread. Still think it's a plane, though!

... so I'm not completely entrenched in the poop.

May we all be so blessed!

 

[Ann K]

I interpreted it as climbing away, largely on account of the flaring contrails. Upon reflection, that looks like a pretty dang steep climb, though, unless the moon is pretty low to the horizon. I am now having trouble visualizing the angle and accounting for the spread. Still think it's a plane, though!

I've been trying to find altitudes (if, indeed, this is the observatory at Wadi Al Hoqain. The Wadi itself is in a deep gorge but presumably the observatory would have been on one of the surrounding peaks...whose height I've been unable to get! Here's a photo of the area, while the nearby airport at Rustaq is pretty much at sea level. so an approaching plane would have been climbing.

Edit to add: almost any observatory would like to be at the top of the hill, so the same may be true even if I've identified the wrong one.

 

[Mendel]

I've had a hard time finding observatories in Oman, but someone named Yousef Zahir al Salmi established one at Wadi Al Hoqain (presumably on one of the surrounding peaks), which is +/- 15 miles to the southwest of Rustaq airport. https://www.muscatdaily.com/2020/10/25/omani-sets-up-astronomical-observatory-in-south-batinah/

To document astronomical phenomena and spread awareness among members of society, an Omani has set up an observatory in Al Hoqain in the wilayat of Rustaq in South Batinah.

Content from External Source

No mention of the wadi, which denotes the river area. Hawqayn, as Google transliterates it, is a community (county?), with Fort Al-Hawqayn as landmark.

You could use Google Earth to find elevations, or use the coordinates with Peakfinder.

Just a lazy back-of-the-envelope calculation: if the aircraft is 50m wide, and appears 1/100 the size of the moon at an angular size of 0.005⁰, it is 50/sin(0.005⁰) m away, that's ~600 km or 350 miles. At that distance, the surface of the Earth has dropped ~70,000 ft. from horizontal, so you'd pretty much have to be on a peak to see that aircraft. (Or it could be a smaller, military high-altitude jet.) And the moon would have to be fairly low. (This is why an accurate location and time should accompany any serious UfO report—here, it would allow us to pin down the direction and elevation of the moon.)

At any rate, close airports won't matter, and the aircraft is unlikely to be in a steep climb.

 

[Trailblazer]

I've only just come across this thread and I'm amazed that it got any interest from anyone at all. It's so clearly just a plane that I don't see how it could ever be mistaken for anything else. It's not even a confusing or strange perspective or anything, it's just a very ordinary looking plane with contrails. What am I missing?

The size comparison of an airliner in front of the moon is misleading because it clearly shows a plane much closer to the camera than the one in the video (and probably at quite low altitude, given the lack of contrails)



Note the lack of contrails too.

In this example the plane is about 1/2.5 the angular diameter of the moon. Assuming a plane length of 40 metres that would imply the plane is only about 384400km x ((40m x 2.5)/3475000m) = 11km away.

 

[MonkeeSage]

I've only just come across this thread and I'm amazed that it got any interest from anyone at all. It's so clearly just a plane that I don't see how it could ever be mistaken for anything else. It's not even a confusing or strange perspective or anything, it's just a very ordinary looking plane with contrails. What am I missing?

It was apparently picked up by tabloids like The Daily Mail and The Sun. I saw it on a recent compilation arguing that all of the "Dementor" videos show the same UFO. All of the others were easy to see were just contrails in shadow, but this one was giving me trouble because the angle of the contrails do not match the apparent motion.

It appears to move slowly across the frame and to have a mostly horizontal motion relative to the camera. The motion appears to be around 45° perpendicular to the angle of the object--i.e., the object is moving left to right across the frame while the object is "pointed" towards the top right.

@Ann K 's explanation that the camera is tracking the moon which is causing the apparent horizontal motion made it make sense to my brain.

 

[Eburacum]

I've seen a lot of contrails, and I just don't like the amount by which those streaks flair out, in particular if the aircraft is coming towards us

This is a highly magnified image. As I interpret it, the contrails are behind the plane, flaring backwards and away from the plane, which is coming towards us up the sky.
Here is the image of the plane in front of the moon - note that the plane only seems to be less than a minute of arc in width.

Here are a few examples of planes coming towards the camera, with the trail spreading out behind it.





This one I'm not sure of, but I am fairly confident it is coming towards the camera. Admittedly, it is difficult to tell one way or the other, because the plane appears to be flying sideways. Probably the camera is tilted.

 

[Eburacum]

And here's one from Metabunk

Original post here
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/ph...at-you-took-yourself.1487/page-21#post-180512