I would like to ask the astronauts

Not only three years ago, but even 10 and 20 years ago, this was already observed over Tagil. And this summer, too. With good regularity, this phenomenon is repeated in all details. But if in the distant 70s, teachers at school with a mysterious look said that this was a "military secret", then in the era of glasnost the same thing became a "mass invasion of aliens". Among the numerous light phenomena of the night sky, this happens most often over Tagil, we will even touch on 4 specific cases that occurred about three years ago.

Events develop in the same way: observers see a bright point object, others (depending on visual acuity) - a ball surrounded by a haze, glowing "like a lantern in a fog." A bright "searchlight" beam stretches from the object to the horizon, sometimes 3, 5 or more. The visible direction of movement is from the northwest to the east. The whole phenomenon lasts 3-5 minutes, the glowing trail remains in the sky for up to half an hour. So it was on October 3, 1989, when the object passed low over the horizon in the northern part of the sky. April 11, 1990 - quite high above the horizon in the north, on the night of May 7-8, 1990 and October 17, 1990. Perhaps many Tagil residents could supplement this list with their own observations.

Even then, in the Tagil Worker, a version was expressed about the missile origin of this phenomenon, and by people who had the most direct relation to missile launches. Indeed: a bright point is the nozzle of a running engine, a searchlight beam is a gas-dust plume, which even in the dead of night can be illuminated by the sun and look very bright in the night sky. And indeed, the entire active part of the flight from launch to orbit lasts 8 minutes. Now we know the location of the Plesetsk cosmodrome (in the north of the Arkhangelsk region) and that the trajectories of the launched satellites are mainly to the east. The phenomena observed from earth during rocket launches are described in the literature and exactly correspond to those observed.

And now, when the data on the launches of the satellite are published, it is possible, by comparing the dates, to make sure that on October 3, 1989, we observed the launch of Cosmos-2047, on April 11, 1990, the Photon satellite was launched (by the way, a commercial launch with French equipment), and on May 7, 1990, Cosmos-2077 entered orbit. But there is no data on the launch on October 17, 1990 – and no wonder, because it did not proceed like the previous ones and ended with the explosion of the object, its transformation into a circle, which gradually blurred, merged with the sky. Whether it was a planned experiment or engine malfunctions, we may find out someday, as we now know that when Energia was first launched in 1987, not a "mock-up of a heavy satellite" was lost (according to TASS reports), but a real satellite.

Quite often, with the launch of rockets, experiments are conducted related to the sounding of the upper atmosphere, when clouds of various substances are ejected at altitudes of 100-200 km. They are observed as bright blurring balls, sometimes changing color as the ionization of discarded products. A whole series of such launches has been carried out in recent years from our oldest cosmodrome Kapustin Yar, which led to mass reports of UFOs and the creation of ufo clubs in the area. Perhaps similar experiments are being conducted in other parts of the country, in any case, Tagil has already seen similar in 1981 and 1986.

It's interesting to see how UFO legends are born. Late at night on May 7, 1990, Cosmos-2077 launches. Those who observe the phenomenon from a hill with an open horizon clearly see that the object passes at least tens of kilometers away from them. But here Puzanov Pyotr Ivanovich opens the door to the canopy (in the village of Staraya Chesnokovka, Samara region) and ... He "saw on the edge of the field, near the support of the power line, an incomprehensible object of a round shape with a red ray. The beam had the shape of a cone, at the top with a diameter of 30 cm, at the bottom - about 30 m. A bright beam with clear edges came out of the sharp part of the oval and illuminated the support of the high-voltage line...". If you replace centimeters and meters with degrees, which are only suitable for measuring in the sky, you will get a familiar picture, which many Tagil residents saw that night. But according to a similar "measure", the artist begins to draw – and it turns out what is needed: the "plate" sucks energy from our power lines.

And then a collection comes out, where similar observations are collected. They are interpreted, as a rule, unambiguously, and the authors bitterly complain about the dominance of "official science".

Maybe we can try to achieve publicity in these matters through our deputy - cosmonaut V.I. Sevastyanov?

A. KUZNETSOV,

amateur astronomer

"Tagil worker" 09.12.1992