TheCholla
Active Member
What do you think of this ?
Source: https://twitter.com/Gtoffo/status/1400858141663825921?s=20&t=0XgLcbKkk_iVciQWIR7XcA
Recreating the Gimbal's "Fleet" on the SA Page with Sitrec
- Thread starter Mick West
- Start date
Source: https://twitter.com/Gtoffo/status/1400858141663825921?s=20&t=0XgLcbKkk_iVciQWIR7XcA
I talked to him before I added the SA page to Sitrec. I was trying to get him to be more precise, but unfortunately, he started to have concerns about talking about classified things - he said even the range of the SA page would be something he was not comfortable, discussing and he'd have to think about it. Then we ran out of time.
But right now we don't have a consistent story that works with the video.
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
Alphas answer doesn't really tell us much.
Maybe you can have your all your normal tracking ATFLIR RADAR correlation etc turned off, but why would you?
You have a radar lock on a target you want to see what it is, you set it as L+S hit SLAVE and everything automatically points at it.
But they are very obviously NOT doing that in the GIMBAL video, why? It certainly leaves the door open for them to have a different target on RADAR than the ATFLIR is pointing. Which is kind of what they are debating in the audio. It also leaves the door open for them messing with the settings, as with Go Fast (same crew I think is now apparently confirmed)
eg another explanation is
L+S is simulated RADAR track as they initially suspect as per the report.
ATFLIR is pointed and auto-tracked on distant aircraft on a similar but not identical LOS?
Confusion.
Maybe you can have your all your normal tracking ATFLIR RADAR correlation etc turned off, but why would you?
You have a radar lock on a target you want to see what it is, you set it as L+S hit SLAVE and everything automatically points at it.
But they are very obviously NOT doing that in the GIMBAL video, why? It certainly leaves the door open for them to have a different target on RADAR than the ATFLIR is pointing. Which is kind of what they are debating in the audio. It also leaves the door open for them messing with the settings, as with Go Fast (same crew I think is now apparently confirmed)
eg another explanation is
L+S is simulated RADAR track as they initially suspect as per the report.
ATFLIR is pointed and auto-tracked on distant aircraft on a similar but not identical LOS?
Confusion.
TheCholla
Active Member
@jarlrmai I could accept this theory if there wasn't so much match between the reconstructed trajectory of Gimbal from the FLIR, and the description of the radar track on the SA. The object stopped on the SA when the lines of sight curve (i.e. the object has no clear horizontal velocity) in the range provided by the WSO.
Even if there was uncertainty on when the stop does actually happen, how do you explain that a radar track would show a stop like this, all that while locking by error on a wrong target?
A weird radar glitch, with other glitches shown as a fleet, right when the pilots lock on a random unidentified plane? And the random plane has lines of sight that coincide with the trajectory of the bogus radar track, in the range of that radar track? How far-fetched is that?
We come back to only a bizarre instrument glitch can explain this forum's scenario, but there is no evidence that the instruments were malfunctiuning.
Even if there was uncertainty on when the stop does actually happen, how do you explain that a radar track would show a stop like this, all that while locking by error on a wrong target?
A weird radar glitch, with other glitches shown as a fleet, right when the pilots lock on a random unidentified plane? And the random plane has lines of sight that coincide with the trajectory of the bogus radar track, in the range of that radar track? How far-fetched is that?
We come back to only a bizarre instrument glitch can explain this forum's scenario, but there is no evidence that the instruments were malfunctiuning.
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jarlrmai
Senior Member.
All we have to go on the radar data is someones word though, if i'm being totally honest I personally feel like Graves seems to be almost 'retconning' the SA/RADAR descriptions based on the wilder interpretations of the GIMBAL video. This is purely my view not a 'Metabunk' view or a Mick view, I have no idea what others think.
I'd rather not try to have a fractured discussion with him over Twitter as Mick has attempted, if we can't have it on this forum then where can we have a discussion with open/honest Q and A with answers to the questions that feel like they are being dodged? So we can see if his recollections actually do explain things.
If we take a step back what we are essentially saying that there is a more rational explanation for GIMBAL based on the video alone i.e. what we can see, Graves says there is RADAR etc data we cant see that says that we are wrong, but when we ask for more details or try to reconcile what is said with that we know about the systems used we don't get a satisfactory explanatory model. If GIMBAL truly is evidence for some extraordinary thing then this forum and Mick and I etc are the only people basically looking at it hard enough to provide any counter argument to it basically being the among the most important documents in history with Graves being the gatekeeper of that information. Convincing us is at the moment the final stumbling block really. But Graves seems unwilling to partake in the discussion in any real depth.
DavidB66
Senior Member.
The fact that the radar reportedly showed a 'whole fleet' of objects behaving bizarrely that were not observed in any other way is itself evidence of malfunction. Not conclusive, obviously, but still evidence. If the speed equipment at Wimbledon showed a tennis serve at 250 mph, you wouldn't shout 'world record serve!', you would ask someone to check the equipment. But it seems that common sense goes out of the window when UFOs are involved.
TheCholla
Active Member
@jarlrmai Well said, and I also wish we had an easier communication with the pilots directly involved in these events. They show some kind of hedging, that can be interpreted with suspicion. But also it's understandable because as you say, they are seen as some sort of gatekeeper for this mystery, which they didn't ask for. Every single word is scrutinized, and reporting this stuff is not their job. They don't seem to be very interested in our nerdy discussions on every single detail of the vids, they are people who like action I guess, not endless debates.
One last thing I don't think they see people on this forum as the "stumbling block", they aim for members of Congress etc... But for sure people who have spent the most time analyzing these videos are here!
One last thing I don't think they see people on this forum as the "stumbling block", they aim for members of Congress etc... But for sure people who have spent the most time analyzing these videos are here!
TheCholla
Active Member
It's not a question of common sense, there is simply no way to prove the instruments were malfunctioning. They say they didn't, who else would know better?
And this is not an isolated event, sightings/radar returns of weird object happened before/after. They would know at this point if their systems were malfunctioning all this time.
The Gimbal event very much is isolated. A fleet in a V-shape doing a U-turn, followed by a different object? Actual video? This seems like a unique set of circumstances.
We technically don't even know if "radar" is the right word to use here. In the latest round of FOIA'd documents we see
What's the missing word? "Radar" doesn't fit (too short), neither do other common acronyms like "TWS" or "RWS", nor does there seem to be a pressing need to redact WWII technology. So where was the information coming from? How reliable is it, particularly when tracking, say, a stealth platform with a sophisticated electronic warfare suite, like an F-35?
What's the missing word? "Radar" doesn't fit (too short), neither do other common acronyms like "TWS" or "RWS", nor does there seem to be a pressing need to redact WWII technology. So where was the information coming from? How reliable is it, particularly when tracking, say, a stealth platform with a sophisticated electronic warfare suite, like an F-35?
Mauro
Senior Member.
I agree. The sentence about the 'whole fleet' has been often reported as "Look at the ASA" (actually I have never seen it reported as "Look at the SA" before I saw it in this thread).
Now I'm no motherlanguage English, i cannot tell if they said "Look at the ASA" or "Look at the SA". But if they said "ASA" then it's not a radar, it's an Automatic Spectrum Analyzer:
DoD Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms
An Automatic Spectrum Analyzer is a device which is used to analyze and categorize electromagnetic signals received by an Electronic Warfare suite, in practice a group of passive, directional radio receivers used to keep the electromagnetic environment under control, such as this one:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AN/SLQ-32_electronic_warfare_suite
An EW suite is able to find, more or less roughly, the direction from which a certain emission is coming from and is able to categorize and classify it (ie: different airplanes may be distinguished from the characteristics of their radar emissions). The target position cannot be pinpointed, nor the distance determined in any way except by triangulation, if one has two EW receivers far apart enough.
The world is full of electromagnetic disturbances, false echoes, anomalous propagation, anomalous signals (ie.: from a faulty transmitter somewhere), etc. etc., and the EW suite receivers are very sensitive. That's what they 'saw': a whole fleet of spurious signals which could have come from practically anywhere in the world (or even from a malfuctioning of the EW suite itself). Events like this happen regularly and noone would even remember this 'whole fleet' weren't it for the F-18 crew coincidentally imaging something else a little later, with that 'else' being totally unrelated to the original EW observations which triggered the frenzy of the chase.
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
It's 'SA' for sure, the F18 does not have that instrument, the phrase 'ASA' is either people misinterpreting it or the pilot misspeaking / accent / audio quality.
They mean the Situational Awareness screen on the other cockpit monitor. Which is an overhead ownship centered display of all tracks known to the aircrafts computer.
They mean the Situational Awareness screen on the other cockpit monitor. Which is an overhead ownship centered display of all tracks known to the aircrafts computer.
Mauro
Senior Member.
SA or ASA, it's not a radar. The situational awareness screen gets its data from many sources, including radars and electronic warfare systems. The targets shown could have been detected by an EW system (for instance, on one of the ships) with a giant uncertainty range (and even a dubious existence, possibly).
I'm sorry I cannot post an image, but if anybody has ever played Command: Modern Air/Naval Operations (CMANO) (*) he'll be used to see uncertain targets detected by EW assets: they pop in and out of existence suddendly, they jump around hundreds of miles crazily and do any kind of strange things. I think this is what they saw on their displays: not radar returns, but EW tracks. If they said 'ASA' (as so many people have said since the beginning (**)) this is sure, while if they said 'SA' this is not a confirmation at all that they tracked the 'fleet' with a radar. But even if they did, this does not imply the tracks they saw were even real, nor that they were in any way related to the object imaged in the video.
(*) CMANO is barely a game, it's more an aero/naval warfare simulator, with special attention given to sensors. I'd love to show you pictures of what I mean, but my copy remained on my old PC and I cannot run it anymore now. I'm sorry.
(**) I have to apologize again because I cannot give you a link, but I remember an old TTSA post in which they said 'Look at the ASA' which they then explained "is a kind of radar" (which is false).
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jarlrmai
Senior Member.
Where did I say it was a RADAR?
Mauro
Senior Member.
You didn't, indeed you questioned why there was no 'lock' indication on the display, which I took to mean you don't think it was a radar. But the discussion was revolving about radar/non-radar when you posted 'It's SA for sure' in your post #52, I needed to point out that the Situational Awareness display (if they said SA and not ASA after all) is not a radar too.
DavidB66
Senior Member.
That's an important point which I don't think most people are aware of. I wasn't, and I suspect neither was Dimebag2 in his comments at #44 above:
If in fact the mysterious objects on the SA screen were not from radar at all, but some system we know little about, then arguments about the probability of radar 'glitches' are moot.
nomuybueno
New Member
I believe the person on the radio may be referring the the AESA (APG active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar system). They just pronounced it "Ay-ES-Ay"
Link to article about an updated version of this (already in use) Raytheon product on F/18 Hornets in May 2022
Here: https://www.naval-technology.com/news/raytheon-tests-apg-79v4-asea-radar-on-usmc-f-a-18-hornet/
What do you guys think of this?
Link to article about an updated version of this (already in use) Raytheon product on F/18 Hornets in May 2022
Here: https://www.naval-technology.com/news/raytheon-tests-apg-79v4-asea-radar-on-usmc-f-a-18-hornet/
What do you guys think of this?
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Mendel
Senior Member.
Metabunk link policy requires us to quote from external links, like so:
Article: Raytheon Intelligence & Space (RI&S) have successfully conducted the first flight of its pre-production APG-79 (V) 4 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar system.
The radar flew on US Marine Corps' (USMC) F/A-18 Hornet multirole aircraft at Naval Air Weapons Station in China Lake, California.
During the flight test, the USMC pilots demonstrated the radar system's integration with the classic Hornet avionics.
jarlrmai
Senior Member.
Given the SA is the name of the screen that they would actually look at and seems to be most commonly selected screen that is on the other MFD, it seems highly unlikely they are saying look at the "instrument that provides the data' rather then look at the screen that we always have on the right MFD. Especially given multiple places supply that data.
And even if they were saying that the screen the data from that RADAR would be on is most likely the SA screen..
Mendel
Senior Member.
Article: The AN/APG-79 is a variant of an active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar developed for the United States Navy's Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and Boeing EA-18G Growler aircraft, providing a high level of aircrew situational awareness.
The radar has a range of up to 150 km (80 nm) and multi-target tracking capabilities.
The APG-79 radar completed formal operational evaluation (OPEVAL) testing in December 2006. As of January 2007 the radar was installed in 28 aircraft; some were experiencing software problems but that issue was expected to be resolved by the end of fiscal year 2007.[4] As of July 2008, Raytheon had delivered 100 APG-79 sets to the Navy; on 3 June 2008, the Navy received the first APG-79-equipped Boeing EA-18G Growler. The Navy expects to order approximately 437 production radars.[5]
In December 2020, Raytheon offered AN/APG-79 for retrofitting the F/A-18 C/D.
Which type of F/A-18 was involved in the GIMBAL encounter?
The more off-axis the target is, the lower is the effective antenna cross-section, since an F-18 AESA does not swivel. This limits the range.Article: With a half wavelength distance between the elements, the maximum beam angle is approximately 45°.
nomuybueno
New Member
I did some fishing and Ryan Graves (F/A-18 Super Hornet pilot) mentions the AESA upgrade in an interview with Tim Ventura.
Starting at around 08:51 of this interview with Tim Ventura.
I would greatly encourage watching the entire interview if you can.
Starting at around 08:51 of this interview with Tim Ventura.
I would greatly encourage watching the entire interview if you can.
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That would be an F/A-18F, a "two-seater Super Hornet". Interestingly, Ryan Graves recently came out saying that only aircraft equipped with the AN/APG-79 were seeing the tracks (this interview, approximately at 9:40). Also interesting how both this and the tic tac happened shortly after installation of a new radar system.
I don't think there's any question that what we hear is "SA", just pronounced a little weird. Notice that Graves in the interview above pronounces AESA as "ay-suh" /'eɪ.sə/, not "ay-ess-ay" /eɪ.ɛs.'eɪ/ or "ee-ess-ay" /i:.ɛs.'eɪ/. I think the aviator in question just pronounced "the" as /'ðiː/ instead of the more usual unstressed /ðə/, and this is getting confused with the beginning of the subsequent word. This is one of the most intensely discussed portions of that particular audio; if it was anything other than SA we'd surely know by now.
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Mendel
Senior Member.
So that would've been in 2006 when the APG-79 was being tested.External Quote:
The interface on the APG-73 had a modification that allowed an AESA antenna to be installed with little overhead (resulting in the AN/APG-79).Article: Das Interface wurde modifiziert um zukünftig auch mit geringem Aufwand eine AESA-Antenne installieren zu können (hieraus resultiert dann das AN/APG-79).
This is presumably why Graves calls it an upgrade.
Just before the Gimbal encounter the Navy tested the APG-79 radar:
While the situation had improved compared to those other tests mentioned in the Wikipedia article, problems remained:
Now, Ryan Graves said on Twitter that just prior to the Gimbal encounter they:
But could it still be that something about the Gimbal encounter involved something the APG-79 might've had trouble with ?
Article: From FY12 into FY14, the Navy conducted Software Qualification Testing (SQT) of System Configuration Set (SCS) H8E for the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet ... the second phase tested improvements in the APG-79 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar
While the situation had improved compared to those other tests mentioned in the Wikipedia article, problems remained:
Article: SCS H8E demonstrated incremental improvements in capability in Phase I. APG-79 reliability improved during both Phases I and II testing compared to previous operational tests and provides improved performance compared to the legacy APG-73 radar employed on earlier F/A-18 aircraft. Nonetheless, key deficiencies in operational performance remain to be addressed.
While the AESA radar demonstrated improved reliability, radar software instability resulted in failure to meet reliability and BIT performance requirements.
Now, Ryan Graves said on Twitter that just prior to the Gimbal encounter they:
Article: just practiced using your F18's radar to send telephone pole sized missiles ... [and] They flew out of the way during a night RTB, which just concluded with a perfectly functioning radar, to pursue something out of the ordinary.
But could it still be that something about the Gimbal encounter involved something the APG-79 might've had trouble with ?
Article: The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet weapon system continues to demonstrate operational effectiveness and suitability for most threat environments; however, the platform is not operationally effective in specific threat environments, which are detailed in previous DOT&E classified reports.
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Ryan Graves on Lex Fridman,highlighted bits that describes the motion on the SA page:
Source: https://youtu.be/qLDp-aYnR1Y?t=5930
Source: https://youtu.be/qLDp-aYnR1Y?t=5930
Still rather unclear. "Turned pretty sharply"? I wish he's put some numbers on things - even if it's just the number of seconds for each stage of the process.External Quote:
TheCholla
Active Member
I think so, yes. That's a schematic for the initial configuration, he has always said the fleet broke formation while turning.
And with the fleet turning, an offset has to happen between it and Gimbal on the SA.
Gimbal was going left to right on SA, and that's what reconstructions from the FLIR give us at that range. It stopped briefly at the end, and went the opposite direction, which is also what the reconstructions show us.
I think there are hints of the vertical maneuver in the vid as we see the clouds get noticeably lower in the FOV right when reconstructions predict the U-turn at ~10Nm (clouds are pretty flat in that portion).
But that's another question.
And with the fleet turning, an offset has to happen between it and Gimbal on the SA.
Gimbal was going left to right on SA, and that's what reconstructions from the FLIR give us at that range. It stopped briefly at the end, and went the opposite direction, which is also what the reconstructions show us.
I think there are hints of the vertical maneuver in the vid as we see the clouds get noticeably lower in the FOV right when reconstructions predict the U-turn at ~10Nm (clouds are pretty flat in that portion).
But that's another question.
(my bold)
In the same way that UFO stopped meaning "unidentified flying object" to have a meaning by its own ("alien spaceship"), is the same going to happen to "gimbal"? "Gimbal" will no longer be a device to orientate the camera, but a synonym of "flying saucer"?
I said once that pilots are the end-users of technology, but that doesn't make them experts in the technology. Speaking about spooky "Energy fields" revealed by IR is the kind of things that make me think he does not really understand IR images.
Can the "gimbal" object be identified in the SA page? I mean, if I understood right, Graves was able to see "the fleet of them" in his own SA page, but not the IR footage. The video has to be shown later, after being downloaded/saved from the ATFLIR to any computer. Then, how can he "synchronize" what he is shown later in a video, the way "gimbal" behaves, with what he saw in the SA page? How does he know the "gimbal" is changing direction, rotating or whatever, before, after, or at the same time than the fleet turns? Or is the IR video from ATFLIR also shared via datalink?
(my bold)
So, the U-turn while climbing is not something Graves witnessed? but he is now taking that hypothetical scenario from the calculations of others, while ignoring the straight-line scenario that would look the same.
He seems to favor the abnormal maneuver deduced by others to keep the strangeness, instead of using Occam's razor.
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I don't think he means a Gimbal, he's using the wrong word. Gyroscope maybe, or spinning top. - not that it really looks like either of them.
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jarlrmai
Senior Member.
And I think he's trying to deflect from the gimbal name of the video matching the prosaic explanation towards the video name being about the shape. But he won't have an open conversation with anyone skeptical who will question what he says so who knows.
Here's my plan for the fleet, based on what should be the most authoritative description available.
Source: Persistent Detection of Non Participating Aircraft by USN Tactical Aircraft ~ Ryan Graves, AIAA AV21
So a new contender for "most authoritative" emerges. Ryan Graves has a new article, and this time includes four mock-up images of the SA page.
Article: The GIMBAL object was located between 5 and 10 miles away, while these other objects appeared to be spaced 3 to 5 nautical miles apart. What these numbers mean is discussed in more detail below. Offset to the north, and ahead of the GIMBAL object, this formation made a maneuver (I believe to the left) that caused the wedge formation to break down a little into what appeared to my trained eyes to be poor formation keeping.
Here's the first image. Presumably near the start of the video, but no times are given.
The SCL/20 means 20 NM from the plane icon to the top of the compass rose, so this is showing the Gimbal (i.e. the supposed object in the video) about 8NM away, and at a heading of about 315 (or 45L)
An issue with the headings is that Graves has not changed the compass rose or the plane icon, so it looks like it's flying in a straight line, when we know that it's actually banking to the left, and will turn through around 45°. There's simply no account for this in these diagrams or the description, which alone makes it nearly useless for reconstruction.
Another huge issue is that the fleet is depicted as flying EAST. This is WITH the wind, not against it. Graves is a bit unclear here, saying:
Article: Offset to the north, and ahead of the GIMBAL object, this formation made a maneuver (I believe to the left) that caused the wedge formation to break
The HAFUs are also odd. Graves has the Gimbal as hostile, and the fleet as friendly. Also, top and bottom of the HAFU seems to indicate data from both on-board and datalink?
In Sitrec, I have them all as ambiguous, and only onboard data (top half):
Graves then depicts the Gimbal moving 6NM from start to the turn-around point. For this to work with the LOS it would be something like:
Note the "Target Speed Knots", which has a paid and constant deceleration from around 15000 knots to zero, then "bounces" back in the other direction - a very strange motion. Viewed from the side, it's very sharp.
Frustrating, as I've tried to get Graves to give detail before, and now this almost feels like one step back.
New Sitrec has a default setup that attempts to get close:
https://www.metabunk.org/sitrec/?sitch=gimbal
TheCholla
Active Member
Less extreme configuration with more realistic speeds/turn rates.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD_Ekbd6c78
(Open the video in Youtube if it's blurry, my video does not upload here)
This is what I call the middle-ground scenario, in which the object stops on the SA, but not in the air. It's simply decelerating below wind speed (120 Knots). In that configuration the fleet is facing the wind as it turns, about when the WSO says "they're going against the wind".
This reconciles the object being a rotating glare, and the pilots seeing a stop/reverse on the SA.
With wind facing Gimbal, we get in a configuration in which the object both stops on the SA AND in the air, suggesting it reverses direction and the rotation is intrinsic to the object. As I've said before I stay open-minded about the glare theory and the object rotating, hoping we'll hear from Raytheon/ATFLIR experts one day.
Given the results accumulated over the years, with culmination through Sitrec, there is room for a less passionate discussion, I think.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD_Ekbd6c78
(Open the video in Youtube if it's blurry, my video does not upload here)
This is what I call the middle-ground scenario, in which the object stops on the SA, but not in the air. It's simply decelerating below wind speed (120 Knots). In that configuration the fleet is facing the wind as it turns, about when the WSO says "they're going against the wind".
This reconciles the object being a rotating glare, and the pilots seeing a stop/reverse on the SA.
With wind facing Gimbal, we get in a configuration in which the object both stops on the SA AND in the air, suggesting it reverses direction and the rotation is intrinsic to the object. As I've said before I stay open-minded about the glare theory and the object rotating, hoping we'll hear from Raytheon/ATFLIR experts one day.
Given the results accumulated over the years, with culmination through Sitrec, there is room for a less passionate discussion, I think.
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TheCholla
Active Member
There has been discussion about Ryan Graves saying the object stopped on the SA, then rotated. See below.
That can be retrieved in the scenario when Gimbal is facing the wind. The object stops on the SA before the rotation. In that case it also stops in the air about when the rotation happens, questioning the rotation being a camera artifact. It looks like this.
Source: https://youtu.be/ql6rzMl3ADw
Note the altitude climb is less than before in these scenarios including wind, ~100-200ft.
Things are interesting when you look closely, there is plenty to discuss.
Article: "The wedge formation was flying, let's call it north, then they turned their return radius right into the other direction, which is how aircraft turn. We have to bite into the air. So they turn in the other direction and keep going. Meanwhile, the 'Gimbal' object that was following behind them suddenly stopped and waited for the wedge formation to pass. Then it tilted up like you can see in the clip, and that's when my video cut out, but it just kept following the other five or six, doing like a racetrack pattern," Graves stated, explaining what isn't shown on the public "Gimbal" video.
That can be retrieved in the scenario when Gimbal is facing the wind. The object stops on the SA before the rotation. In that case it also stops in the air about when the rotation happens, questioning the rotation being a camera artifact. It looks like this.
Source: https://youtu.be/ql6rzMl3ADw
Note the altitude climb is less than before in these scenarios including wind, ~100-200ft.
Things are interesting when you look closely, there is plenty to discuss.
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Indeed there is. One thing that needs discussion is something @Edward Current brought up, maybe a year ago. The non-physical nature of the nearby path(s)
Graves says:
Article: they turned their return radius right into the other direction, which is how aircraft turn. We have to bite into the air.
Which suggests he thinks there is some aerodynamic action going on. However, with the Gimbal, he recalls that it slowed down and stopped in a straight line. This was indicated by the "aspect vector" pointing in one direction before doing a sudden flip. You see this in the current Sitrec defaults. Here I've put the SA in N-UP mode so we see absolute motion. I've also made the "target" jet (I'll get a flying saucer in there eventually) much larger so you can see the rotation along the path. Compare this with the rotation of the glare.
There's been some talk of the amazing coincidence of the object rotating as it turns. But it really isn't. Consider what is supposed to happen physically or even in some Lazarian physics.
For an object to change velocity, it needs a force acting on it. Lazar and others postulate flying saucers have that force along their vertical axis, and so to move, they tilt - like they have a rocket pointing straight down. Horizontal = hover, tilted = flying sideways (and this obviously requires the amount of "thrust" can be modified, as the less you point down, the more you need to counteract gravity)
So, looking at the motion, is there any correlation between tilt angle and acceleration? No. Acceleration is essentially CONSTANT through the curve,
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TheCholla
Active Member
But you're comparing the rotation of the object to the curve of the ground track, correct? What matters for intrinsic rotation is the curve of the air track (blue).
Setting up Sitrec so that Gimbal is facing the wind, with heading that gives an increase in size of ~20% (both parameters that match the video/audio), we get a ground track that stops ~5-6 seconds before the rotation on screen (stop on the SA), and an air track that matches the rotation of the object (the object stops and reverse speed when the rotation happens around frame 900). See below.
That's the coincidence between rotation and U-turn that has been pointed out.
Setting up Sitrec so that Gimbal is facing the wind, with heading that gives an increase in size of ~20% (both parameters that match the video/audio), we get a ground track that stops ~5-6 seconds before the rotation on screen (stop on the SA), and an air track that matches the rotation of the object (the object stops and reverse speed when the rotation happens around frame 900). See below.
That's the coincidence between rotation and U-turn that has been pointed out.
What matters is acceleration, which is independent of wind speed. Here's a graph of the net G-Force on the object in the nearby straight-line, vertical u-turn scenario. This graph is in the current version.
Red arrows indicate the rotations, with the longer arrow being the longer rotation.
The g-force here is nearly all horizontal (blue is the vertical component, related to the slight change in altitude)
It's between 2 and 4g, constantly, for the full 35 seconds of the video.
There's no relationship between the changes in acceleration and the rotations.
Code used to calculate accelerations - simply takes difference in the difference between two consecutive movement steps.
JavaScript:
getValueFrame(f) {
// can't do the last two frames, and ignore the one before that
// as final frames are often corrupt
if (f > this.frames - 4)
f = this.frames - 4;
// get three points where the timestep between then is t = 1/fps
var p0 = this.in.source.v(f)
assert(p0.position !== undefined, "CNodeGForce needs a position track")
p0 = p0.position
var p1 = this.in.source.v(f+1).position
var p2 = this.in.source.v(f+2).position
// get two distance vectors
var s1 = p1.clone().sub(p0)
var s2 = p2.clone().sub(p1)
// and one acceleration vector
var a = s2.clone().sub(s1)
// Equations of motion say
// v = u + at
// so a = (v-u)/t
//
// s1 = ut + 0.5at^2
// v = u + at
// s2 = vt + 0.5at^2
// s2 = ut + at^2 + 0.5at^2
// (s2-s1) = ut + at^2 + 0.5at^2 - ut - 0.5at^2
// s2-s1 = at^2
// here we've got a vector, so the actual g force is the length of this vector
//
// For sanity checks, use https://www.omnicalculator.com/physics/acceleration
// e.g 1000 knots to 0 over 26 seconds is about -2g
// isolate some components
a.x *= this.components[0]
a.y *= this.components[1]
a.z *= this.components[2]
// it's m/sec/sec so we need to divide this length by the square of the time step
// and see above, s2-s1 = at^2
// t = 1/fps to multiply by the square of fps, same as dividing
var g = a.length() * this.fps * this.fps / 9.81
return g
}TheCholla
Active Member
You have quite an extreme scenario by default. The object speed is very high, and the apparent size decreases by 25%, which is not what we see in the vid.
Speed starts at ~400 Knots, and acceleration stays under 1.2G, in the scenario I describe above (Gimbal facing the wind, heading so that size increases by ~10-20%). Not sure what to make of that, but there are two sharp drops in acceleration, one when the long rotation happens, one around the last sudden rotation.
It's funny that when setting things so that :
- the range matches what the aviators report (6-8 Nm at the end)
- the apparent size is consistent with what we see in the vid (a 10-20% increase)
- the wind direction matches what we hear in the audio (facing the object's trajectory)
we retrieve, among other things :
- a stop on SA (green curve) preceding the rotation (as in Graves' quote above)
- a stop in the air when the long slow rotation happens (blue curve going to 0), and a reverse of direction
Pilots locking by error on a random distant plane could have made for completely inconsistent parameters when looking at close trajectories that the pilots think they had on radar. But things intriguingly check out with what is reported. I only see spoofing (deceiving the radar to underestimate the real distance to the object) as an alternate scenario to the object actually being within 10Nm.
Speed starts at ~400 Knots, and acceleration stays under 1.2G, in the scenario I describe above (Gimbal facing the wind, heading so that size increases by ~10-20%). Not sure what to make of that, but there are two sharp drops in acceleration, one when the long rotation happens, one around the last sudden rotation.
It's funny that when setting things so that :
- the range matches what the aviators report (6-8 Nm at the end)
- the apparent size is consistent with what we see in the vid (a 10-20% increase)
- the wind direction matches what we hear in the audio (facing the object's trajectory)
we retrieve, among other things :
- a stop on SA (green curve) preceding the rotation (as in Graves' quote above)
- a stop in the air when the long slow rotation happens (blue curve going to 0), and a reverse of direction
Pilots locking by error on a random distant plane could have made for completely inconsistent parameters when looking at close trajectories that the pilots think they had on radar. But things intriguingly check out with what is reported. I only see spoofing (deceiving the radar to underestimate the real distance to the object) as an alternate scenario to the object actually being within 10Nm.
