British Military UFO Hotline Closes Shop

After 50 years, and more than 12,000 reported sightings, the British military has decided to shut down its UFO hot line. The Ministry of Defense has deemed that there is no evidence that UFOs pose a threat to the general public. In addition, the shutdown was a cost cutting measure.

There may be some cause for concern, since there will be no avenue for Brits to report suspicious activity in our skies. There is a argument that the lack of a reporting procedure opens the door to terrorist activities. Not sure on that one....

The United States government officially abandoned UFO investigation back in 1969 when it terminated its Project Blue Book. Project Blue Book took in close to 13,000 reports, and with the issuance of the Condon report, concluded that UFOs were not an anomaly and posed no threat to national security. Of the 12,616 reports taken, about 6 percent were declared as unknown events with no natural or man-made explanation available.

It is interesting to note that the Canadian military is still accepting UFO reports, along with any other possible threats to Canadian sovereignty.

Source: Associated Press

Geminid Meteor Report

I was skunked by clouds last night. Complete overcast. I go up early this morning to see if conditions had improved, and this morning we have rain coming down. The rain certainly was expected, as the the weatherman got his forecast right. I was hoping he was wrong this time.

There was no chance for me to see any Geminid meteor shower first hand. This morning I went searching around for some online reports, and for those areas that had clear skies, the viewing was good. Observers were reporting seeing up to 50 meteors per hour according to Spaceweather.com's site.

Speaking of SpaceWeather.com, they have a cool meteor radar that you can use to listen for incoming meteorites. I had a listen this morning, and certainly was hearing about 50 or so pings per hour. It works by listening for far away signals from television and radio stations that may be reflected back down to earth from the ionized trail left by meteors. Ham radio operators use this method quite often on the 6M ham (~50-54MHz) band to get more distance out of their contacts.

Skies are expected to clear tonight over West Virginia on Sunday evening, so I may be able to get out and view some Geminids tonight.

Fireball Seen Over Minnesota and Wisconsin

A fireball streaked across the skies of Western Minnesota and Northern Wisconsin at about 1:15 AM in the morning on Friday December 11th.

Night sky observers reported seeing a bright green flash that turned night time darkness into near daylight to the local National Weather Service Office in Grand Forks, ND. Other reports were made to the Duluth, MN office as well.

Interestingly, the Beckers County Sheriffs Department reported a similar occurrence about a month ago. Conditions were foggy, so it was difficult for them to tell where the object was headed.

The Geminid Meteor shower is just about to reach its peak over the next couple of days. The fireball over North Dakota and Minnesota may be related to the Geminid meteor shower, or it could be a sporadic hunk of rock that just happened to enter the Earth's atmosphere.

Source: The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead

Spiral UFO Seen in the Skies Over Norway

An apparent rocket test in Russia? Or perhaps something else? Experts seem to think that weird spiral seen over the skies in Norway on the night of December 9th 2009 were most likely a misfired rocket from Russia. The object was seen to rise up from the earth, and the stop in mid air. It then began to tumble, apparently spewing something into the atmosphere, possibly rocket fuels as it fell. The falling tumbling action, along with release of the few created a symmetric spiral pattern in the night skies over Norway.

Videos of the spiral seen in Norway has been hitting the YouTube circuit, and I am a bit surprised that it has not made the more larger news organizations. Especially since Barrack Obama is paying Norway a visit to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. I am not sure if it was in fact a misfired rocket, or maybe something else?

Here is a video with some pictures showing some of the more interesting snapshots:

The Best Meteor Showers for 2010

The prospects for a good year of meteor shower viewing for 2010 are somewhat low. Many of the best meteor showers for 2010 appear at a near full moon. Moonlight can hamper the dark sky viewing needed for catching good meteor showers.

Here are my thoughts on the best meteor showers to view for 2010. The criteria for making this list are based on cold vs. warm season, the number of meteors per hour, and the amount of moonlight. This is basically just my opinion, others may have a different opinion

The best meteor shower for 2010 will arguably be the Perseid's. The Perseid's peak on August 13th, smack dab in the middle of summer for the northern hemisphere. These showers also occur just a few nights after a new moon, which falls on August 10th. Usually, around 100 meteors per hour are visible at the peak of the Perseid meteor shower.

The next best shower to view will probably be the Leonid meteor shower of November. There will be a near full moon for this years Leonid meteor shower. The reason I picked the Leonid meteor shower in my number two slot is because of the shear numbers of meteors that may show up per hour may reach a 100 or more.

The Leonid meteor showers are also known for their 33 year peak display. Every 33 years 100's or of meteors per hour may occur for a short time during the peak. These are known as meteor storms. Sadly, the next peak is not due until 2033 or 2034.

Next on my list are the October Draconids. Although one can only expect about 10 or so meteors per hour with the Draconids, there will be a new moon this year.

Other than these three meteor showers, the rest seem to occur during nearly a full moon. Thus viewing will be difficult.

Denver Man Gets UFO Initiative on the Ballot

Jeff Peckman has backed of the wall ballot initiatives in Denver before. In 2003 he backed an initiative that would have required Denver to adopt stress-reduction techniques. This would have required the city to spend money on things like, meditation sessions for its city employees. Needless to say, this one was soundly defeated by Colorado voters.

Now he is proposing that voters approve the creation of a panel pf experts to look into extra-terrestrial activity on Earth and figure out the best way to welcome the aliens to our planet. He would also have the panel seek out people of have been reportedly abducted by aliens be interview. I guess to learn about alien cultures and habits.

He got enough signatures on his petition to get it on the ballot in August 2010. After all, he was only required to get about 4000 signatures in a city of several million people. Having such a low requirement of petition signatures sure opens the door for wacky ballot measures.

A lot of people believe that UFOS exist. I am not committal. I have seen things in the sky, that had me guessing for a second or two, but once I realized what I was seeing, I came to my senses. But there are things that happen in the sky at night that are not readily identifiable. To jump to the conclusion that all UFOs are extra-terrestrial in origin is a bad assumption to make. Spending tax-payer money in UFO panels, in these hard economic times does not make much sense either.

UFO over Miami Skies

An object described as a red ball of fire flew through the skies of Miami on the evening of November 29th at around 7pm. From witness reports to local new agencies, such as CBS 4 TV, it sounds like a Chinese Lantern or maybe some sort of hoax. Chinese lanterns are often mistaken as UFOS and frequently reported as glowing orbs of light. If the lantern happens to catch fire, then it could produce a fireball like effect.

That did not stop local police and fire departments from spending a good portion of the evening searching for the object. The object was reported from people who live near Southwest 84th Street and 52nd Avenue.

It turns out that an object was recovered that was described to be a burning piece of wire mesh, probably what is left of the Chinese Lantern

Mercury in December, Messenger Encounter

Mercury, our solar system's smallest planet will be visible in our southwestern sky for the better part of the month of December. The best chances to catch Mercury will be during the second week of December, when it will reach the highest point, and it will be at its brightest.

The planet will be visible just after sunset in the early evening sky. On December 18th, the crescent moon will be just above and to the left of Mercury, so if you have never spotted the little red planet, then the moon will provide a great guide post. On each successive night the moon will slip further away.

After a couple of flybys of Mercury, which occurred on January 14, 2008 and October 6, 2008 NASA's Messenger spacecraft is set to enter an more permanent orbit on March 18, 2011. A more recent flyby took place on September 29, 2009.

Messenger is expected to orbit the planet for one earth year, mapping the planet for imagery, topography, and gravity field measurements. There is also a theory that Mercury is shrinking due to its core freezing. The spacecraft will look for evidence of surface buckling.