belnox wrote:Quote " The rotation of Venus on its axis is unusual in both its direction and its speed.
yer confusing spin with orbit
she's just upside down
sun comes up in the west
we've been upside down before
ya probably don't remember it, long time ago
belnox wrote:It was quite near to the horizon, so if it was Venus i'm thinking is it possible it slipped out of visual range somehow given its orbit goes the other way
just stop with this part
belnox wrote:It was quite near to the horizon~~~~it slipped out of visual range
Planets do on occasion twinkle. I've experienced this more then once inside the city where I live. I've awaken in the early dark morning to find brilliant Venus twinkling just like all the other stars, it was cold, and there was a slight breeze on the ground, which means the wind speed was probaby much faster at altitude. As I understand it, the reason why stars twinkle is due to disturbances in the atmosphere, because stars are so small (they appear as small points of light through binonculars or even a small telescope) and so because they're so small, the light rays that they send are essentially disrupted as they go through the Earth's atmosphere and ultimately into our eye. Part of those disturbances, is temperature, loads of different temperatures in the Earth's atmosphere... Think of a hot day, and looking down the road and seeing "mirages" or heat waves coming off the ground is what they really are, notice how they distort your vision, and really make if you will, a twinkling appearance to whatever's behind. Same deal with the stars, but because of their small size, the light they send is more subjective to being distorted. Back to planets, planets don't normaly twinkle because of their ever so slightly larger size. A pair of 8x40 bincoluars will reveal this. Take those same bincolars and point them at any star, and they'll still be a fine point of light. (Some would also say stars twinkle because of their relatively further distance, but since there have been no reports from astronauts only hundreds of miles off the ground saying stars were twinkling I disagree, which is also one reason why the Hubble is so successful in taking crystal clear photos, no atmosphere to contend with, and obviously no polution too... Only Asteroids. haha) Because of that, the light rays they send aren't as vulnerable to being distorted like their sister stars are. This is why the moon doesn't not twinkle, it's so big and bright it overrides any Earthly disturbance.
So planets do twinkle, just not as much, or even sometimes just not as noticeably as the stars do. If you spend enough time looking at the heavens you'll know what I'm talking about.
As to what you saw... I would need more info or had to have been there to see it. Perhaps Area 51 is up to their bags of tricks and toys again. As for the meteor you saw, well that was a meteor... Never heard a sizzling sound off of one before, but I have seen some very bright ones while night-fishing, so bright they left a glowing trail accross the sky which lasted for a couple seconds, pretty neat actually.
Neither planets nor stars "twinkle". That effect is caused by turbulence in the earth's atmosphere. It's just more readily apparent in stars since they deliver us so much less light than planets. If it was bright, white, steady, and on the western horizon in the early evening, it's a fair bet that was Venus. Jupiter can also be very bright, Mars not so much (and it's redder). Anyway, "shooting star" is a misnomer that confuses a lot of people.
Charlie Gravel
“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”
― Oscar Wilde
And whether the blood be highland, lowland or no.
And whether the skin be black or white as the snow.
Of kith and of kin we are one, be it right, be it wrong.
As long as our hearts beat true to the lilt of a song.
crookedtune wrote:Neither planets nor stars "twinkle". That effect is caused by turbulence in the earth's atmosphere. It's just more readily apparent in stars since they deliver us so much less light than planets. If it was bright, white, steady, and on the western horizon in the early evening, it's a fair bet that was Venus. Jupiter can also be very bright, Mars not so much (and it's redder). Anyway, "shooting star" is a misnomer that confuses a lot of people.
buddhu wrote:Until it is identified it remains, by definition, a UFO.
Not everything in the sky is flying. Stars don't & neither do meteorites.
And now there was no doubt that the trees were really moving - moving in and out through one another as if in a complicated country dance. ('And I suppose,' thought Lucy, 'when trees dance, it must be a very, very country dance indeed.')
and 
