What the actual F did I just see?!

29 lights flying from west to east over the Shen Valley in a perfect line at the altitude and speed of commercial airliners. Did not move like drones.

Click for video:

IMG_9248

Star Link satellites likely.

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Just some folks flying to say hi to Maduro

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Santa testing some new gear in preparation for the big day. Dodging starlink satellites has changed the game for the big guy.

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santa

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My coworker just said, “google starlink satellites you fucking hillbilly “

Derp

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And we’re just supposed to know this? I feel like those natives on that untouched island where the natives throw spears at helicopters.

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At least you didn’t reply “what’s starlink?”

What time sphere? We saw it driving down the road at about 6:25pm if I’m remembering correctly.

Eta.. what we saw was real quick though, like a meteor. At least that’s what we assumed it was.

Star link satellites is correct, I had never seen them until this fall and have seen them twice since September.

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I saw them for the first time about three years ago and as I recall, immediately posted here fearing alien invasion. (This led to me picking up Starlink as my ISP, which was absolutely game changing until the local power company laid fiber in my neighborhood a year later).

Search is your friend :stuck_out_tongue:

Wreaking havoc among ground-based telescope users (including astronomers, of course). They are forced to do post-processing to eliminate the streaks, and sometimes their long exposures are ruined.

Just around 6:10 pm, moving from the west heading east. It looked like a line of planes at cruising altitude moving the same speed at what looked like the same altitude. Perfectly straight line, but the individual satellites seemed to change their distances from eac other in subtle increments but that may have been an illusion.

Satellites reflecting light makes sense of how they appeared bright and consistently until they moved far enough east that no longer reflected the setting sun and disappeared.

The moon was down and the sky was clear and dark. We get amazing night sky views out here, I just happened to step outside at the exact right moment to catch it. I’ll post the video with expletive muted later this morning.

You are a bad man, lol.

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They appeared to be flying in the same direction and flight path and speed as planes heading for DCA or Dulles. My assumption was it was a line of drones heading back to a local base.

If you didn’t know about starlink, which I obviously didn’t, there’s no “oh yeah that makes sense” other explanation for it except drones heading toward Washington. Planes wouldn’t fly that close together. I can’t imagine it’s common knowledge that people would see it and say oh hey there’s starlink.

There’s a tracker (of course) so you can plan to see them.

This was us. They’ll be back tonight and tomorrow:

(past) 6:01 pm, 16 Dec 2025

Starlink-337 (G6-82) (new), BRIGHT (1.8) for 4 mins
Look from WEST to NORTHEAST (details)
Elevation (from horizon): start: 10°, max: 62°, end: 34°

5:56 pm, 17 Dec 2025

Starlink-337 (G6-82) (new), BRIGHT (2.4) for 4 mins
Look from WEST to NORTHEAST (details)
Elevation (from horizon): start: 10°, max: 41°, end: 26°

5:49 pm, 18 Dec 2025

Starlink-337 (G6-82) (new), BRIGHT (4.0) for 4 mins
Look from WEST to NORTHEAST (details)
Elevation (from horizon): start: 11°, max: 30°, end: 19°

I will one up you:

I feel like we have been seeing the starlink trains in the sky for quite a few years now. At least since COVID.

I was a little busy when that news came out I guess.

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