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While viewing the April 8, 2024 solar eclipse from Jackson, MO, when the moon had eclipsed about 20% of the sun (the bottom-right part), my friend and I both observed with our naked eyes (behind solar glasses) something transit the sun. The transit went from bottom to top and was left of center.

What satellite was that? Is there a website that can assist in answering such a question?

Does the transit being vertical mean the satellite's orbit is over the poles?

EDITED TO ADD: Looking at the animation of the eclipse for Jackson, MO from this page, I think the transit happened around 1:00 PM.

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  • $\begingroup$ I think a satellite would be too small to see without magnification. Even the ISS is pretty small compared to the size of the Sun. For example, were you able to see the sunspot (near the center of the Sun) with the naked eye? That's approximately how large the ISS would appear. The majority of other satellites are much smaller. $\endgroup$
    – JohnHoltz
    Commented Apr 12 at 16:55
  • $\begingroup$ Yes, I could see that sun spot. Maybe it was a bird then. That is so much less interesting though :( $\endgroup$
    – Tyson Williams
    Commented Apr 13 at 3:42
  • $\begingroup$ Somewhat related question in this video... youtube.com/watch?v=bQF51mqzrY4 $\endgroup$
    – user2705196
    Commented Jun 3 at 20:04

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One satellite made a close pass at 1310h local time, according to Stellarium, but it didn't transit the Sun: Screenshot of Stellarium showing view of Sun from Jackson, Missouri at 1310h on April 8th, 2024 Beidou-3 M11 (C25) can be seen moving slowly downwards, transiting the Moon but not the Sun.
The other satellite in the screenshot, Raduga 19, appears to be geostationary.

As @JohnHoltz comments, it's unlikely that you'd have been able to see it with the naked eye.

You can check this yourself by downloading the free program Stellarium and configuring it to show satellites and downloading up to date satellite data.
It's possible that if you input your exact location then the satellite did indeed transit the Sun from your PoV at that location. However the object you saw went from bottom to top, and this satellite went in the other direction.

Another possibility is that you saw a satellite which isn't in the public data sources used by Stellarium.

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    $\begingroup$ Thanks for the detailed answer. In the end, I think we probably saw a bird. $\endgroup$
    – Tyson Williams
    Commented Jun 3 at 12:12

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