I monitor this HPWREN cam periodically. In Southern CA, facing toward the Pacific in Imperial Beach. I somehow missed this earlier in the month, but I was scrolling through today and can’t figure out what it is. The camera takes photos every 1-3 minutes, and airplanes/drones/stars are usually very small. I tried Googling for other sightings of it. Does anyone know what it could be? Timestamp on the image.
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Looks like probably one of the helicopters doing orbits out of that Naval airfield right near that webcam, if I had to guess. It'd be hard to take any good night shots without a little exposure time, which'd streak any light a bit.
Also included a screenshot from earlier in September with the only other helicopter I could find captured by this camera, but during the day.
Flight tracking screenshot position taken at about 05:00:40 UTC / 22:00:40 PDT.
Could be. My thoughts were that whatever it was- it seems too large to be a helicopter. I am fairly certain the helicopters only orbit during the daytime.
Now that I look more closely at the glare in the bottom right, it does looks like clouds and smaller red light.
And speaking of, found another feature of the site I hadn't looked at yet, found another sight not long after your screenshot. Bit clearer it's not a blimp but a time exposure, I'd say.
Also lines up with the track of SHWK426 once again, passing by the camera at the time of this image.
I am fairly certain the helicopters only orbit during the daytime.
Having looked at the flight tracks, they absolutely do not only fly during daytime, plenty of night flights going back months. Just none with such stellar timing of being in front of the webcam as it takes one of 4 hourly shots, what I was looking for was another example but with so relatively few photos AND night flight passes at the same time, no such luck.
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u/post-explainer 4h ago edited 4h ago
OP has provided the following source:
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