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Volume 9: Number 1: Article 2
Digital Video Analysis of Anomalous Space Objects
Mark J. Carlotto, 5 Ryans Place, Beverly, MA 01915
Video data showing multiple objects moving in unusual trajectories
in space is examined. The video was captured by a camera aboard the
Space Shuttle Discovery (mission STS-48) between 20:30 and 20:45 GMT
on 15 September 1991 near the west coast of Australia. Digital video
analysis is performed to determine if the objects in question are ice
particles disturbed by a thruster firing as contended by NASA or other
objects moving independently of the shuttle. Results of our analysis
show that it is unlikely that a thruster firing occurred since the attitude
of the spacecraft does not change. Our analysis indicates that there
are two groups of correlated object motions. One group changes direction
at the time of a flash, claimed by NASA to be due to a thruster firing.
The other group changes direction 1.5 seconds later. Assuming the objects
are roughly the same size, brightness measurements of the objects as
they pass over the airglow layer near the limb suggest that the objects
in the first group are farther away yet they change direction first.
This behavior is inconsistent with the thruster firing hypothesis. For
one of the objects known as the "target", it is shown that the only
hypothesis that is consistent with the data is that the object is at
or near the physical horizon. We go on to show that several other objects
in the video are clearly moving in circular arcs and are thus likely
to be relatively far away from the shuttle. The estimated speed of one
of these objects, about 35 km/sec, is approximately the same as that
of the target if we assume that it is at the physical horizon. At the
end of the event, the shuttle's camera pans down to reveal a number
of objects moving below the shuttle. One of the objects appears to have
a definite structure consisting of three lobes arranged in a triangular
pattern.
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