(meteorobs) Did anybody see Tuesday's "Mystery Cloud?"

[Skywayinc at aol.com]

    I am wondering if anybody in the eastern US or Canada noticed an unusual 
circular cloud that was visible for roughly a half-hour, beginning at around 9 
p.m. EDT in the west-northwest sky.  I was first alerted to it by my friend, 
Long Island observer, Sam Storch.  He had left a message on my answering 
machine at 9 p.m. I had arrived home a short while later, having spent the 
afternoon and early evening in New York.

    When I arrived home it was 9:08 . . . eight minutes after Sam left his 
message.  I quickly rushed outside to take a look and immediately spotted a 
large circular glow in the general vicinity of a triangle of stars composed by 
Tau, Phi and Upsilon Herculis.  Sam mentioned how its appearence reminded him of 
Comet IRAS-Iraki-Alcock . . . funny, because MY very first impression was that 
I was looking at an oversized version of that comet as well!  I estimated the 
total magnitude of the cloud to be in the third-to-fourth magnitude range and 
approximately 3-degrees in width.

    I quickly ran inside to fetch my 7 X 35 binoculars, where the 
expanding/fading cloud appeared distinctly V-shaped, but with two noticeable (albeit 
fainter) extensions.  It was also drifting northward; by 9:23 p.m. I could barely 
see it with the unaided eye, having moved into the Lozenge-shaped head of 
Draco, almost directly over the second-magnitude star Etamin.  I then ran in to 
call John Bortle, who had also been watching the cloud from about just after 9 
p.m.  He described his initial view at a " . . . zero to +1 magnitude object, 
that appeared in binoculars as resembling the petals of a day lilly."   
Interestingly, Sam said that his older son, Joseph, saw the same cloud from Ithaca, 
NY and said that in 7x50 binocs, in mag 4 or 5 skies he reported " . . . a 
star-like point or nucleus and four butterfly shaped petals radiating outward.  No 
evidence to him of motion, but he is an untrained yet truthful observer."  

    As to what this cloud was . . . I don't think it was caused by a barium 
sounding rocket from Wallops.  It certainly was in the wrong part of the sky 
for something like that (if it was from Wallops, it should have been over to our 
south . . . not west-northwest).

    Quite possibly this was something similar to another "mystery cloud 
sighting" that occurred back August 12, 1986 (see Sky & Telescope, November 1986, 
page 546).  That incident was widely seen by observers all across the eastern 
US and Canada -- many were out looking for Perseid Meteors.  The unusual cloud 
sighting was ultimately traced to a Japanese satellite launch.  Apparently 
unused liquid fuel was released from the rocket's second stage.  Because the 
satellite was in a 900-mile high orbit, it accounted for the wide visibility of 
the cloud.  I strongly suspect that tonight's mystery cloud sighting was similar 
to this 1986 episode.   
 
I am hoping that somebody out there on the Internet will have an answer for 
us shortly.

-- joe r.