2015-06-22 - Kaukauna, WI - Oval

White, fuzzy, oval light travels Northwest over Kaukauna, WI

We could clearly see stars, and all of a sudden a large, fuzzy,oval shaped white light appeared at 10:42 pm CST and started moving from the Southeast to the Northwest. It moved soundlessly and slowly and traveled in a straight line.

There were no blinking lights and no definitive outlines. It was just sort of a large solid glow. It was WAY too big to be an airplane, satellite or meteor. We could clearly see the Big Dipper to the left of this light, and if you divided the cup of the Big Dipper into equal parts, this light would have been about 1/16th of that size.

Then it faded away. There were clouds out that night, but this light traveled where the clouds were not, so we got a good look at it. Kind of freaked us both out.

We have never seen anything like this.


((NUFORC Note: Out-gassing event of spent rocket. PD))


((NOTE FROM MR. TED MOLCZAN))

Hello Peter,

Your hunch probably is correct.

The Sentinel 2A satellite was launched on a Vega rocket from the Guiana Space Center, last night at 9:52 PM EDT (Jun 23
01:52 UTC).

Coverage of the launch was here:

http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/06/22/vv05-mission-status-center/

SeeSat-L received several reports of sightings near 23:49 EDT (3:49 UTC), of what appears to have been exhaust from the final burn of the Vega rocket's AVUM liquid fueled upper stage. That burn lowered the perigee to ensure that the object decays from orbit within a reasonable time, in order to curb the growth of space debris.

http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2015/0193.html

http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2015/0194.html

http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2015/0195.html

http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2015/0198.html

http://satobs.org/seesat/Jun-2015/0199.html

Marco Langbroek blogged his analysis:

http://sattrackcam.blogspot.nl/2015/06/aurora-hunter-images-last-moments-of.html

Please let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Best regards,
Ted

((END NOTE))