Help identifying object

Alabastor_Twob

I saw an object in the sky near the star Vega on the 11th of October, and I was wondering if anyone would be able to tell me what it might be. It appeared to be a dim red or brown star quite close to Vega, except for the fact that it was out of focus if the surrounding stars were in focus. Admittedly I wouldn't consider myself to have much experience with astronomy but I don't think I can remember ever needing to adjust the focusing dial when moving from one star to the next.
I was outside for a good 40 minutes before I had to go inside for other reasons and in all that time it didn't move at all relative to the stars around it, so I don't think it was a satellite. In that time I was looking at other things as well, checking back on it occasionally so I don't think it was dirt on the telescope mirror or something like that either.

The coordinates were RA 18h 35-37m, approx Dec +38.6 deg, taken by finding what I believe to be the same part of the sky in Google Earth.

I have been away since then so I haven't been able to go out since then and check if it's still there, hopefully I can have a look tonight.

Kersh

M57 Ring Nebula maybe?

Not really all that close to Vega, but woth a shot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_Nebula

Alabastor_Twob

I don't think that was it. This was much closer to Vega, it could be seen at the same time as Vega within the telescope's field of view. Also when the telescope was focused on it it appeared to be a point source like a star, it just wasn't when the other stars were in focus. I was going to see if it was still there last night but it was raining all night. Perhaps it will be clear tomorrow.

If I get a chance I'll see if I can have a look at the Ring Nebula to compare it.

Alabastor_Twob

I wasn't able to attach images until I hit 50 posts:

This is where it was. I made this image from a screenshot of a phone app on the night, so the position is fairly accurate. The green circle shows approximately the field of view of the telescope, although I just added that now from memory so it might not be especially accurate. The red dot is fairly close however. I made a sketch of it and the surrounding stars when I was at the telescope and they all correspond to the ones around Vega in the image.

Kersh

What size scope are you using? What eyepiece size?

This is a bit of a stretch, as it needs very big scopes to see but..

http://www.deepskyforum.com/showthread.php?605-Object-of-the-Week-July-27th-2014-A-galaxy-chain-near-Vega

These guys using, for the most part, 18" - 48" scopes to view, but reckon brighter members are visible in 11" sct or 6" refractor.

Alabastor_Twob

I was using a Newtonian with a 130mm primary mirror and a 20mm erecting eyepiece (I leave that in the telescope since it didn't come with a case, and I had forgotten to bring out my 10mm regular one).
It wasn't a great night for stargazing, so I don't think that it was enough to view that tbh.

When I got home tonight at about 09:20pm it was a beautifully clear sky, so I immediately brought the telescope out with both eyepieces to have a look. It was still visible, although it appeared to have moved, and appeared white or possibly blue rather than brown this time. I don't recall what the surrounding stars looked like on the 11th so the brown colour may have been a side effect of the sky conditions.



It is only a very small amount of movement but I'm pretty sure that before it was about halfway between those two stars, and now it's closer to being in the middle of the three.

Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a longer look at it since a few minutes after going out a heavy bank of clouds came overhead and it started raining. I had been using the 20mm erecting eyepiece since it has a wider field of view and I wanted to find it had it moved significantly, and when I switched to the 10mm I didn't see it unfortunately, possibly because that was when the clouds were coming in so it wasn't bright enough to see at that point. (Plus I had to get my bearings since everything was flipped)

Do you think it's possibly an asteroid or a piece of space debris? Given that it was nearly two weeks since I last looked at it and it has only moved a tiny amount it must be quite far away from the Earth.

mickmackey1

I reproduced your image below, 1 is a magnitude 8 star and 2 is a mag 6.95 star. But neither 3 or 4 exist at that brightness, unless you mean 3 is the new position of your object. Anyway on the right is a quick shot I fired off the other night, there's nothing brighter than mag 8 in that region. I think its a problem with your optics, maybe caused by the dazzle from Vega.

Alabastor_Twob

3 is the new position. It was significantly fainter than the other stars, the first night I couldn't see it with the centre of my vision. It could be a problem with that eyepiece then. I couldn't see it with the other one but I wasn't sure if that was because of the clouds or whether it was the eyepiece. I'll have to experiment when I get a chance to see if something similar happens nearother bright stars.

bogwalrus

Could gravitational lensing be the cause for making one of the suggested stars brighter or maybe some other spacial anomaly that can make stars look as if they are shining brighter. Probably just something in atmosphere though.

Popoutman

It would be worth seeing if the position of the "object" moves in relation to the background stars depending on where Vega is relative to the centre of the field of view? Does the position change relative to the background stars through the night, as I suspect the OP's scope is an alt-az mounted scope, and the placing of the artefact will stay relative to vega and the horizon instead of the background stars

Also, rotate the eyepiece while looking at the area and see if the object moves.

Does it still exist when using differing combinations of eyepieces?

My guess is that it's an internal reflection in the eyepiece, and the change in focus appearance makes this almost certain..