Three flux transfer events (FTEs), observed by the AMPTE/IRM spacecraft in the southern hemisphere magnetosheath are studied by use of variance analysis of measured magnetic fields, B, and convection electric fields, Ec=-v¿B, with the objective of determining the orientation and motion of the flux tube or magnetopause bulge causing the FTE signature. These FTEs preceded a series of magnetopause crossings during which the high plasma flow speeds, characteristic of quasi-steady reconnection, were present. The main results are as follows: (1) For each FTE, a moving so-called deHoffmann-Teller (HT) frame of reference can be found, in which the local plasma velocities are nearly antiparallel to the local B vectors and have magnitudes in the range 70%--90% of the local nominal Alfv¿n speed (assuming all measured ions to be protons). The velocities of motion, vHT, of the HT frames for all three events, and for two subsequent magnetopause crossings, are sufficiently similar so that a single HT frame orders the data in this manner for one full hour. (2) In the first FTE, the spacecraft appears to have sampled fields and flow around a moving tube or elongated magnetopause bulge. The tube orientation and motion (given by the component of vHT perpendicular to the tube axis) could be determined along with impact parameter (ℓ≂1.4a), tube diameter (2a≂8000 km), and, with reasonable assumptions, tube length (L>20,000 km). The tube was found to move southward past the spacecraft, consistent with the observed negative-positive signature in the component of B along the magnetopause normal. The ambient magnetosheath plasma moved in the opposite direction. (3) For the second and third FTEs, which were close encounters (ℓ/a<1), the tube orientation and therefore its motion could not be reliably determined. (4) On the whole, the observations are consistent with ongoing magnetopause reconnection with a time-modulated reconnection rate that leads to repeated ejection of bulges in the magnetopause from the reconnection site. ¿ American Geophysical Union 1989