Anyone Near Duncan, Oklahoma? Weird Light In The Sky Right Now And No Power.

If this is in the wrong forum, I apologize.

My friend is from Oklahoma and said she has no power on her entire block right now (except for the house in the pic, strangely) and there's this weird, red light in the sky. I suggested it could be a fire, but she said it's not and that pic was taken out of her front door and she can see it in the sky out of her back door as well, and that it's actually in the sky and not coming from the ground. She's no expert so take this all with a grain of salt, I just thought it was strange and would share.

The upload feature isn't working for me for some reason, so if someone would be so kind to post this puu.sh...

Is that the northern lights? They are supposed to be bright tonight, but it is awfully cloudy here so we can't see them.

originally posted by: MadhatterTheGreat
If this is in the wrong forum, I apologize.

My friend is from Oklahoma and said she has no power on her entire block right now (except for the house in the pic, strangely) and there's this weird, red light in the sky. I suggested it could be a fire, but she said it's not and that pic was taken out of her front door and she can see it in the sky out of her back door as well, and that it's actually in the sky and not coming from the ground. She's no expert so take this all with a grain of salt, I just thought it was strange and would share.

The upload feature isn't working for me for some reason, so if someone would be so kind to post this puu.sh...

Here you go


Pretty odd. Is it just that neighborhood?

Probably just ambient glow from lights in the distance that she normally can't see when all the lights in her neighborhood are on.

originally posted by: rickymouse
Is that the northern lights? They are supposed to be bright tonight, but it is awfully cloudy here so we can't see them.

Maybe, might be easier to see since the power is out. It's overcast in Duncan. My other thought is maybe lights from elsewhere in the town reflecting up and having the effect get enhanced by the local power outage.

Thanks!

Also, yes it's just her block. I didn't know about the Northern Lights but I looked up a coverage map and apparently, OK isn't a visible state, but I did find some articles from 2011 that people in Northeast, OK could have a rare sighting of it back then, but she's in the southern part of the state, near Texas.

a reply to: MadhatterTheGreat

Northern lights can come pretty far south if there is a CME hitting us. I've seen lots of people on here who are knowledgeable about that stuff. I'm very far from an expert.

That being said I'm not aware of auroras being that color or one color at all. Every one I've seen is a combo of cooler colors like purple/blue/green. That doesn't look like the northern lights to me. Again I'm not an expert though. Just my two cents.

a reply to: MadhatterTheGreat

I'm about an hour from Duncan. I just went outside and the sky definitely is orange, but it's cloudy and lights are reflecting off of the clouds.
Also, I have seen the northern lights a few times here. But it's too cloudy to see them tonight.

If it were me, I would probably jump in my car and try to get a better take on the situation. Either try to get a better picture up close, of get a better perspective on the situation. I would be interested if other people near the area of this red light in the sky have witnessed the same thing. If so, than you really have something there.

a reply to: MadhatterTheGreat

brightness, contrast, gamma and saturation adjusted.




honestly to me it just looks like the city lights in the distance reflecting off overhead clouds, ive seen something similar many times.

originally posted by: Answer
Probably just ambient glow from lights in the distance that she normally can't see when all the lights in her neighborhood are on.

That's the most likely. In infra-red you would see that as a noticeable grey/white light, whereas just being out in the darkness you might have difficulty seeing it all with your own eyes.

a reply to: MadhatterTheGreat

I live just south of Duncan, but slept through the storm last night for the most part. It has the whole town talking though, apparently power transformers were blowing left and right, and the southern part of town was without power for a few hours. Reports of a green glow by multiple witnesses.

The pic coupled with reports of blown power transformers (induced current) seem to point to a solar flare activity. It doesn't help that most of our power infrastructure is 4 years older than dirt around here.

I also live just south of Duncan in a small town called Comanche. Last night before I went to bed (just after 1 am) we still had power but I could easily see this glow OP is talking about. The power went off here at around 3am based on my blinking clocks reporting 4 o'clock at 7am. I think it had a lot to do with the fine mist that was saturating everything and ambient lighting! Luckily it didn't freeze overnight and the roads are safe (so far anyways! it's supposed to get colder.)

I didn't witness it while the power was off so I cannot attest to the orange glow during that time.

Oklahoma is known for weird light in the sky I hear.

Kind of a bright, golden haze?

www.youtube.com...

originally posted by: Psynic
Oklahoma is known for weird light in the sky I hear.

Kind of a bright, golden haze?

www.youtube.com...

Yeah when I saw it I thought "cool" but didn't think much into it as it's something I've seen before. Especially when there's low cloud cover or it's hazy out.

a reply to: lurker007

Small small world. I live in the same town, or a little outside of it towards the lake to be more specific.

The only odd thing i noticed about the power outage, is usually it only goes out in high winds at my house. Well, I'm a fairly light sleeper so the sound of my fan losing power and printer rebooting as it powered back up woke me up. Took a quick look out the window and the trees were completely still.

A small world indeed!

Typically when we lose power here it's only for a very short duration. It didn't wake me this morning but it normally does.
As I mentioned in my previous post, the orange haze seemed familiar so I didn't think much about it.

What direction was she looking? If she was looking west, it's Lawton.

a reply to: Mr Headshot

From what I saw it consumed the whole night sky. This was around 1 am and there was power here in Comanche but it's a VERY small municipality so it could have been street lights that made the orange glow here.

Its just normal light pollution.