CHAVEROCHE (19) 27.07.2012

On 27 July 2012 between 04:20 and 04:25, a witness noticed a silent, oval, milky-white light crossing the sky. After about 45 seconds, a second orange light appeared and followed the first’s path ‘perfectly’. They moved in a straight line at constant speed and separation before the landscape hid them. GEIPAN identifies a rare joint passage of the ISS, magnitude −3, compared in the source with Venus, and Japan’s HTV cargo spacecraft, magnitude 3, a few hours before docking. They were on the same orbit, separated by a few degrees (see CalSky records and the Canadian Space Agency webpage). The case is classified A, fully identified as the ISS and HTV passage. GEIPAN notes that the witness described the object as Moon-sized and the observation as lasting 45 seconds; such estimation errors are not uncommon in surprising sightings.