What is this object from the ISS live feed in 2016?

[AllTheQuestionsToday]

Seen here:


Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/aliens/comments/16em2vv/this_is_one_of_the_best_videos_that_nasa_ever/


It moves from right to left and is circle highlighted.

It then seems to decelerate.

Then appears to idle in place.

Then appears to accelerate again toward the left.

 

[Mendel]

☑ white dot of light
☑ no accurate date and time given
☑ nobody else noticed it
☑ resurrected footage years out of date
☑ incredulity instead of analysis
☑ "coverup" because the experts don't acknowledge it (ufology as conspiracy theory)

First, "nearing the Earth's atmosphere" is not in evidence.
Secondly, we've seen this kind of apparent motion before, e.g. in footage of airliners, and it's always caused by the observer being in motion (as the ISS certainly is), which causes parallax effects. They trick our brains, because we're used to stationary observations (and we're stationary in front of our screen).

My take:

Stage 1: the satellite crosses close in front of the ISS. It's slightly lower than the ISS, therefore its orbital speed is faster, but it's moving at a slant, so the ISS starts to "overtake" it.

Stage 2: as the satellite moves away from the ISS, perspective makes it appear closer to the horizon, much like an aircraft that flies overhead and then disappears in the distance. As it draws parallel with the ISS, its speed allows the satellite to briefly overtake the ISS.

Stage 3: as the satellite moved closer to the ISS, its apparent altitude increases again. As the trajectory slants more, the ISS is able to overtake it.

Basically, there are two effects at work:

A: perspective. The object is first close, then far, then close again. This changes the apparent "distance to Earth's atmosphere" when the real altitude may remain unchanged. (The satellite could also be on an elliptical orbit with varying altitude. Perspective would still apply as described.)

B: parallax. The "curved" trajectory made the lower and faster satellite seem slower than the ISS at the beginning and end of the clip, and faster in the middle.

Note: the ISS and the satellite travel on "great circles", i.e. they fly essentially "straight ahead", but because their path is not on a flat but on a spherical surface, they cross.

Source: https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/565524/intersecting-great-circles-to-find-position


Or it could be fake.

 

[FatPhil]

Obvious fake. The ISS would have moved 6 degrees around the earth during the time of that video, which means the sun would also have moved between 5.5 and 6.5 degrees too. I can't be arsed to work out whether the vectors would be summing or subtracting, because it doesn't really matter - anything in the range 5.5 to 6.5 leads to the same conclusion. The sun moves precisely zero degrees. It's not a live stream, it's a still. Which means that anything moving on it is composited.

 

[Mendel]

Obvious fake. The ISS would have moved 6 degrees around the earth during the time of that video, which means the sun would also have moved between 5.5 and 6.5 degrees too. I can't be arsed to work out whether the vectors would be summing or subtracting, because it doesn't really matter - anything in the range 5.5 to 6.5 leads to the same conclusion. The sun moves precisely zero degrees. It's not a live stream, it's a still. Which means that anything moving on it is composited.

I see the surface and the terminator moving. It's definitely not a still.

 

[Mendel]

There was another widely reported ISS UFO video on July 9th 2016, but that one is different.

 

[FatPhil]

I see the surface and the terminator moving.

I can't see that myself, but on a rewatch, the sun does move a little as the lens flares change angle. It should be possible to extrapolate the rays back and work out where the sun is and how much it's moved. Knowing what that corresponds to in angular terms alas requires knowing the FoV of the camera and whether it uses a flat or spherical projection.

Having the original video, with timestamps, would of course have been more useful.

 

[Eburacum]

Small dots of light in ISS clips are usually small ice particles emitted from the various external systems on the station. These ice particles tend to move in a straight line, unless they are caught in the exhaust from an attitude jet or rocket motor. However these small ice particles often appear to make independent movements, and accelerate or decelerate, because the ISS itself is moving; usually the movements of the ISS occur when they make a minor attitude adjustment, using the same attitude jets mentioned above. Remember that all the windows and cameras of the ISS are located some distance away from the major axes of rotation, so any adjustment in attitude will be magnified by the movement of the camera about those various axes. This may be a small, nearby ice particle remaining relatively motionless, and the camera is moving in relation to the particle.

However if the ISS were changing its orientation with respect to the sun, the sun's glare would change shape and angle significantly. This doesn't seem to happen, so I don't think the movement of this object is caused by re-orientation of the ISS. I'm gravitating towards fake, unless we can get a timestamp and independent confirmation.

 

[Mendel]

I'm gravitating towards fake, unless we can get a timestamp and independent confirmation.

When I found the other 2016 UFO sighting, that guy had a trove of ISS live feed UFO videos on his channel, but not this one. I kinda wonder if this particular camera placement can even be dated to 2016, the clips I saw all look different (but I was going by the thumbnails, so...).

 

[Eburacum]

One possibility I didn't consider is that this particle was filmed during a reboost; in that situation, the ISS is steadily moved in one direction, making anything not firmly attached to the vessel fall steadily behind. This includes astronauts, who are gradually pulled backwards as the ship accelerates.

Here's a view of this process from the inside, sped up by 8x.

Source: https://youtu.be/hfO0wIXAxmI?feature=shared


A free-floating particle outside the ship would also show a similar movement.

 

[JMartJr]

I wish the clip started a second or two earlier. What we have shows the object just as it appears to appear from behind the whatever-it-is-this-arrow-is-pointing-at:



If it started a few seconds earlier, we could maybe SEE if the dot passes in front of that bit of the station, or emerges from behind it. (Whatever it is is so bright that a small bright spec might get washed out, though.) Something that stops like that seems to, makes me wonder is it inside the station and is being carried along (and stopped) by air currents. If it is beyond that exterior bit of the station, then I would consider that ruled out, of course.

 

[Eburacum]

That might work. During a reboost, there are probably quite significant air currents along the length of the interior.

 

[JMartJr]

. During a reboost, there are probably quite significant air currents along the length of the interior.

My understanding is that there would always be air currents, air needs to sirculate to be filtered, etc. CAVEAT: Not a life-support engineer for NASA, not even slightly.

 

[Scaramanga]

Seen here:


Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/aliens/comments/16em2vv/this_is_one_of_the_best_videos_that_nasa_ever/


It moves from right to left and is circle highlighted.

It then seems to decelerate.

Then appears to idle in place.

Then appears to accelerate again toward the left.

The caption says 'hovers for 35s'....but I measure it at 10s or so. So does that mean the 'normal' version is also speeded up ?

 

[FatPhil]

Here's a view of this process from the inside, sped up by 8x.

Source: https://youtu.be/hfO0wIXAxmI?feature=shared

Can someone please just buy NASA some furry dice? You can easily make scientific measurements using furry dice - it's much harder with untethered astronauts!


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5WgSQKsnoQ


Please don't correct my physics, I know how wrong it is. However, if we put the furry dice on *weak elastic*...

 

[Eburacum]

Can someone please just buy NASA some furry dice? You can easily make scientific measurements using furry dice - it's much harder with untethered astronauts!

The Russian Soyuz spacecraft use a teddy bear on a string; when the bear floats, they are in microgravity.

 

[AllTheQuestionsToday]

I have no idea and am just sharing this, but apparently Reddit saw this thread presumably and tracked down a source?


Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/16g9xf1/i_may_have_found_more_evidence_to_a_video_posted/

 

[JMartJr]

The Russian Soyuz spacecraft use a teddy bear on a string; when the bear floats, they are in microgravity.

Should use a helium balloon -- just to confuse everybody.

 

[FatPhil]

Should use a helium balloon -- just to confuse everybody.

Super happy that there's enough smarts here think of that and recognise what's been said, but it might woosh some people. Here's a pretty good demonstration:


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-UzBitLmf8

 

[Ann K]

Super happy that there's enough smarts here think of that and recognise what's been said, but it might woosh some people. Here's a pretty good demonstration:


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-UzBitLmf8

I've seen that happen. I was once driving behind a car with a great big bunch of balloons in the back seat, and then the driver having to fight off the balloons when she accelerated after a stop. For a demo of the effect I later filled a bottle to the brim with water and added a hex nut and a little piece of styrofoam, then capped it. When I accelerated it (by spinning around rapidly) the two objects went, of course, in opposite directions.

 

[Mendel]

Something that stops like that seems to, makes me wonder is it inside the station and is being carried along (and stopped) by air currents. If it is beyond that exterior bit of the station, then I would consider that ruled out, of course.

I think we see the reflection of the camera lens in the window, so out of focus that we can only almost read the writing on the lens.

This implies a) there's not a lot of space between the lens and the window for air or objects to move in, and b) whatever is in that space should be very blurry, being out of focus.

I'm convinced the dot of light is outside the station, or fake.

 

[JMartJr]

I think we see the reflection of the camera lens in the window, so out of focus that we can only almost read the writing on the lens.

This implies a) there's not a lot of space between the lens and the window for air or objects to move in, and b) whatever is in that space should be very blurry, being out of focus.

I believe you are correct here, the chances of my "floating speck inside the station" hypothesis being true now seem to be very small.

A small hope remains -- IF the round object in the reflection is a more distant hatchway between modules or some such interior structure of the station, rather than a close-to-the-window camera lens. But to my eye it looks sufficiently like a view down the camera lens for this to be the likely correct interpretation.

Interior view of the Zvezda Service module:
(Note: Many of the hatches in ISS are not circular.)​

​

Compare to selection of Nikon cameras on the ISS:
​

 

[Alien Chess Fiend]

Small dots of light in ISS clips are usually small ice particles emitted from the various external systems on the station. These ice particles tend to move in a straight line, unless they are caught in the exhaust from an attitude jet or rocket motor. However these small ice particles often appear to make independent movements, and accelerate or decelerate, because the ISS itself is moving; usually the movements of the ISS occur when they make a minor attitude adjustment, using the same attitude jets mentioned above.

It does look like ice to me, with the variation in brightness as it moves. This video debunking another case shows lots of examples of ice from the thrusters during docking:


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga9c2hcwmOI


There's an example of a change of direction visible around 1:06 to 1:09:

 

[Eburacum]

According to the Reddit thread posted by @AllTheQuestionsToday

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/16g9xf1/i_may_have_found_more_evidence_to_a_video_posted/

this was a fake; someone watched the original stream and couldn't see the anomaly, which must have been added later. Unfortunately the link to the archived stream isn't working, so I can't confirm this.

 

[deirdre]

this was a fake; someone watched the original stream and couldn't see the anomaly,

why dont you quote that bit? instead of making us go search for the info.

 

[Eburacum]

Ross Coulthart apparently posted a tweet saying it was a hoax more than a year ago, so we might have been expected to know about it.

Just learned from Astral Citizens that the supposed @NASA
live feed video is a hoax. Lesson learned. Nonsense hoaxing like this gravely undermines efforts to investigate real imagery:

Warning- the link in this tweet is apparently unsafe.

Source: https://twitter.com/rosscoulthart/status/1545026215563563009

 

[Eburacum]

Some commentators on Reddit have mentioned the fact that 'skeptics' explained this hoax as a 'dust particle', therefore all skeptical explanations are mistaken.

I must admit I thought it was a hoax at first, but then began to tie myself in knots finding a non-hoax explanation. Perhaps my convoluted, non-hoax interpretation might even have worked, but it turns out my first explanation was correct after all.

 

[Alien Chess Fiend]

This looks like the right timestamp on the video posted in that reddit thread.


Source: https://youtu.be/bQOIoecjgB0?t=29756

 

[Eburacum]

Yes, that is all I can see.

 

[JMartJr]

I suppose it should have been a bit suspicious when it pauses that close to the center of the frame to pose for us...

 

[deirdre]

This looks like the right timestamp on the video posted in that reddit thread.


Source: https://youtu.be/bQOIoecjgB0?t=29756

smh timestamp 8:15:43

 

[Eburacum]

The recorded NASA video is working for me, now, and there is no sign of the UAP. A definite fake. Thanks!

 

[deirdre]

Warning- the link in this tweet is apparently unsafe.

did you click it? i didnt and went right to Wayback machine...no proof just some guy saying he debunked it and allegedly the creator admitted to it. Not that this matters as the proof is the ISS live stream video, not some guy claiming he debunked it without providing proof..

here's that link in wayback machine..

https://web.archive.org/web/20220707145349/https://astralcitizens.com/ufo-nasa-iss-live-feed/

 

[Eburacum]

I didn't click it- for some reason my browser told me it was a potential security risk.

 

[Mendel]

I suppose it should have been a bit suspicious when it pauses that close to the center of the frame to pose for us...

That wasn't the problem for me.

My problem was, a) no time stamp, b) none of the UFOlogists monitoring the ISS feeds had noticed it at the time.

 

[JMartJr]

That wasn't the problem for me.

Not THE problem, but in retrospect it seems something a faker might do, but is a heck of a coincidence if voyagers from Omicron Persei 8 chose that spot to stop obeying orbital mechanics and hover for a moment.