Strange Flashes in the night sky ,what are they,and have you seen them?

Well....after years of reading ATS posts, I had to sign up so I could post on this topic myself. I see it goes way back....so does my story.

First off.....reading through these, I'm finding many similarities in stories but also many differences. I think some of the people saying "flash" and/or "blink" are sometimes meaning the same thing but, other times, not.

My story took place at PRECISELY 2:00 am (a time I've seen mentioned in other posts....interesting) on October 27, 2008. I have lived my whole life on the central gulf coast of Florida (also seen mentioned in some of these other posts) but had never seen anything like this before (I was just a few days shy of my 40th birthday at the time), nor have I seen it since.

I found myself working as a night security guard for a gated community and worked from 6:00 pm to 6:00 am on Saturday and Sunday nights. We normally had golf carts to drive around (a VERY large community) but on this particular evening it was broken down. I had been told by my boss that I didn't have to patrol too heavily this night but....that's just not me. Sometime after midnight, I decided to walk the entire outer perimeter of the property. As I finished this walk, I went to where my truck was parked. I leaned against the bed of the truck, turned my head so I was facing straight up at the sky and (Dammit!) closed my eyes for a moment (it was an exhausting walk).

You know how, when you close your eyes and someone shines a flashlight (or as mentioned in several other postings...a flashbulb) you can still see it? That's what happened here.....my first thought was someone took a picture of me. I opened my eyes and could see NOTHING but a bright blue light....ALL AROUND ME.....I couldn't make out shapes, structures, NOTHING...I was literally blinded by this light. It didn't hurt at all....it just totally obscured my vision of anything else. It lasted for 5-10 seconds and then the light faded out to a point in the sky. My next thought was that a transformer had blown somewhere nearby. I forgot to mention that I was wearing an mp3 player (listening to Led Zeppelin....yeah) at that moment but thought to myself that, even with the music, I should have been able to hear a transformer blowing.....but didn't.

As my eyes readjusted to the normalcy of the night, I realized that the street and building lights had all gone out. The only light visible was from the guard shack at the front gate, which had an emergency back-up generator. I decided that I should ask that guard if there was any protocol to follow for this situation and started to walk over. I had only taken a few steps when, suddenly, it happened again. Everything around lit up bright blue (quite beautiful, actually)....again totally blinding me, as if I was actually inside this light. This time, I didn't have the headphones in and was aware of an electrical buzzing/crackling/humming sound. Again, after 5-10 seconds the light faded out to a point at the sky.....from my vantage point, though I had moved several feet from the spot where I saw the first one, it SEEMED like the same point in the sky.

I began to resume my trek to the front guard gate when, about 30 seconds later, it happened a third time! Again the crackling buzzing sound....again the fading to the (same?) point in the sky. NOW I was freaked out.....I thought America was being nuked or something. This time though, when the light faded out, the power came back on. Though I had realized all the lights had gone out, I hadn't realized the lack of sound from a/c units had been missing until the power came back on. I was closer to the clubhouse when the power came back on and I noticed that the a/c unit didn't sound right....it kept revving like when you step on a gas pedal. I went into the club house to try to turn it off but...IT WOULDN'T TURN OFF! I checked it again at the top of every hour and, though it was set at 72 degrees, it was still running and reading 55 degrees at the end of my shift.

I wrote everything up in a report, describing it as "electrical phenomena". I learned from one of the other guards later that an a/c company had to be called to come out and fix the problem but never learned what they attributed it to.

I checked news reports all the next day but never heard ANYONE ever mention this. My only potential witness was the guard at the front gate who never saw any of this, probably because the power where he was didn't actually go out. the only part of the story he would be able to back me up on is that, when I finally got to the guard house and was talking to him about it, he could hear the revving of the clubhouse a/c.....normally an inaudible sound from that location.

I did do some checking with Google Earth (to try to determine the direction of the point of light in the sky....wnw as near as I can figure)...and I checked Stellarium for that date and time and (again as near as I can figure) found that the point of light would have been just to the right of the Pegasus constellation. It was a clear night as I recall.

About a year or so later, I saw on the news a fireball that had been captured on a dashcam of a cop's car. It had also been caught on a surveillance camera at some building....watching those videos is the closest thing I have seen to what I saw that night...though still not 100% the same. In news reports about that same fireball, one witness described a crackling sound "like bacon frying"....not exactly an electrical sound but, again, closer to anything else I've come across. The biggest difference was that, in the video, it only happened once...not three times.

OK...that's my story....sorry it was so long.....hope you all made it all the way through my first official ATS post!

It has the general characteristics of St Elmo's Fire, though you haven't mentioned the weather conditions around the time of the events.
The local power disturbances could be associated with that.

St Elmo's Fire

WG3

AH!

A reply!

Thank you!

I suppose St. Elmo's Fire is as good a possible explanation as any.....not being too familiar with the phenomenon I did a quick read up on it before replying......it doesn't sound quite the same, though there are similarities.

To the best of my recollection, it was pretty clear out.....I do remember seeing stars as I watched the light fade off in the sky. I will have to see if I can get some report of the weather conditions from that night.

Thank you for the response!




a reply to: waveguide3

I was looking for info but i guess i have more than whats on here about these strange lights like Polaroid camera flashes. Ive seen at least 60 flashes from above shooting down at my house at night around 10:30pm to 11:30pm. They come from above at a high elevation and i don't believe they are from helicopters or planes because whenever i went outside and looked up the sky was clear with the moon shining bright. The first time i and two others witnessed at least 50 to 60 flashes. They moved a foot a flash as we noticed the angle of the shadows change as if a beam was pointing down but instead a flash. Every time i went outside to look up the flashes stopped, but then started again when we went inside. I assumed it was a satellite and i was being xrayed because of my heat signature at the time, because i had grow lights. That was in 2001 just recently it started again and i had another witness there, same thing but just two flashes. The light is bright as if someone is standing on your roof with a Polaroid camera. This time later when i went inside and told my niece not to trip on it i had two flashes white light in my eyes like i was struck with a x-ray a little while later and im concerned that this could be electronic harassment otherwise known as gang stalking and is becoming more and more evident today. Whatever it is its not a natural thing from nature as i have experienced it more to some degree than others...keep your eyes open and continue to report these things..

After thinking about this for a few years, my "logic" guess would be this - simply the angle in which meteors are exploding in the atmosphere to the observers position. In my diagram, we see one meteor and a flash zone well within the observers field of view. We also see one that happens over a different part of the earth, but likely creates a flash on the horizon to the observer.



Of course, my other side believes the sky flashes when crop circles are made, but only because all the flashes I see are over Wiltshire and never any other direction...

My theory is its an area x-ray scan

My theory is its an area x-ray scan

My theory is its an area x-ray scan

Why would an X ray scan flash visible light? One would assume such a scan would use X rays, which aren't in the visible spectrum.

Just to help all those with this ; basically, I've been seeing these for a while now, and my fiancé has seen them too. We blew it off at first and were blowing it off now! It got me worried so I did about an hour of research and here's the answer you've all been hoping for! Most lightning that occurs is from one part of a cloud to another, but that's the kind of lightning we see the least often. However, at night when the sky is dark, we can see the cloud illuminated from inside by this type of lightning, and it often can appear like camera flashes in the sky. Because the actual lightning bolt is concealed in the cloud, all we see is flashes of light without the "zigzag" lightning bolt. This is often called "heat lightning." Sometimes, because of the dark, we don't realize a storm cloud is there in the sky except for the lightning within it.It's also easier to see this type of lightning when the storm cloud is further away. Because of the distance, the sound of thunder fades away before it reaches you, but the light travels as easily as ever, and so you can see the lightning but not hear the thunder. Storms like this can be as far as 20 miles away and you can still see all the lightning there is to see. Sounds rarely travel that far, however.These kinds of thunderstorms can produce LOTS of lightning, sometimes more than one flash per second. This is especially true if the storm is producing hail within the cloud.

a reply to: tarifa37 greetings tarifa37 about 5 years ago when I was living in Nanango in queensland Australia I was outside about 9pm beautiful clear sky and while I was looking north out of the corner of my left eye I saw a very bright white flash. a few nights later I was out again hoping to see it again and there was no moon by the way, and the whole dark(except for stars) sky suddenly turned a bright purple-violet shade, I had at that time no vision problems except for a slight astigmatism which I am told would not cause that. The colour lasted for about 10 to 15 minutes and to this day I have not seen that or any flashes again. Ufos yes I''ve seen a few but not any flashes. Hope this helps bye and keep smiling and happy-Quekinat.

Okay so last night me my dad and my brother were driving home around 10ish and i noticed a blinking light in the sky. At first I thought it was a plane because I do see planes where the lights flash but this was flashing rapidly. I pointed it out and my brother and dad noticed it as well. The thing is, it was the size of a star and it would blink rapidly and move left to right. It would be in one particular spot in the sky and after a blink or 2 it would move a little bit the left, blink again, and go back to where it was before. Then we noticed that after it moved left to right like that, it was going up and down like, it would be in one position and after it flashed it would either drop down or move farther up to where it was before and go back to it's original position after it flashed. We were still driving and saw that it was flashing in the same spot for a bit and saw how the light was slowly starting to fade. What was really weird was when it started moving left across the sky like a plane but it was moving way too fast to be a plane. After it moved it just stayed in one position and a huge bright white light started glowing sort of like magnesium when you light it up in chemistry class and then the light just faded away. It then moved back across the sky at the fast speed it did before and started blinking rapidly and doing all those crazy movements again. After a while the thing started fading and we lost sight of it but it gives me chills because I have no idea what it was. I looked it up and the only video i've seen that remotely describes this is titled "weird blinking light in the sky." Here is the link www.youtube.com... We know for a fact that it wasn't a plane because we saw at least 4-5 planes near that thing last night and it was no where near close to looking like one, especially the way it was flashing all rapidly. It was really creepy because the light and the size would be huge one minute then fade and get smaller the next. I would really appreciate it if someone knew what it was or would see the video and have an idea as to what it is? Thank you. Sorry for making this so long

i have also seen these here in southern arizona, i thought it was my eyes playing tricks on me, always happens after 9 till about 11-12, always occuring in the 12 o'clock position in the sky.

Ok. My experiences are what led me to this forum. I have only read a handful of posts and will read others when I have more time. I have lived in Northern MN for 20+ years. Over that span I have had 2 similar experiences to others here. Both were similar, but also different.

The first was 20 or so years ago while fishing all night. A buddy and I were on the South shore of Lk. Bemidji. At roughly 3:00 a.m. the sky to the North lit up completely. First Yellow, then green, then magenta. I will describe it as not a flash, but as if someone turned on and off a light switch. All 3 colors were very bright, illuminating the entire sky. Each lasting 2-3 seconds with a second gap between. All colors were pure and did not waiver.

We both agreed that the light was not sourced from the ground. At that time there was nothing really North of the lake other than a few homes. Mostly wooded for miles and miles.

I had pretty much forgotten the experience until I recently had a similar experience where I now live in Duluth. Similar area, nothing but forest for miles. This time I was headed to work at 4:30 a.m. Again the sky lit up entirely as if by light switch. This time the light was pure bright white again lasting 2-3 seconds. This time was just a one time on off light which instantly reduced the radio to static and the back to signal at light's end.

I am no weather expert, but this was not lighting. Both instances occured on calm clear skies.

Glad to see others have had similar experiences.

Unexplained in Minnesota. ....

I have seen them a lot on visits to Monterrey Mexico, they last around 1/10th of a second or less, something incredibly fast and there is no discernible origin, I first thought it was probably the strobe light from one of the radio towers on top of the mountains, but it is not. they appear on clear skies but not on cloudy so the origin from the light must be above the clouds.

ive seen them reply to my thought. something to think about...

2 weeks ago I was camping far out in Tonasket Washington, and was filming the milky way at 2am. There was no moon and vis was excellent, the milky way was very clear to the eye. After about an hour of tracking small satellites, I saw a bright purple/violet flash, just above the milky way crossing it, almost exactly overhead. I adjusted my tripod with lumix gh3 and Olympus 50mm fast lens to the target. I captured an object first flash 3 times extremely bright violet, then faster white pulses. A Flash is brighter and more intense, to me. About half way through its line across the sky, a white object likea shooting star shot fast in front of it! My jaw dropped, because I saw it with my eyes first, and was surprised I happen to film it too. It was very close, as my 50mm lens with 2x crop shows a narrow sliver of the sky. I assert mechanical, because of the white fast pulses.

So my white blinker proceeds at a steady pace, and starts flashing violet again, slower and so much brighter. I adjust my manual camera settings, raising there frames per second from 2 up to 20 or so. What did I capture?

Here is the video for your review. First cropped and zoomed, then the original.
www.youtube.com...

I've wanted to post about this for a long time. But I've also seen this happen at least 2-3 times on separate instances. This happened about 5 years ago so my memory isn't the clearest but it was defiantly in the summer time somewhere between 8-12pm. The flash covered at least a quarter of the sky. No sounds heard and clear sky's.

I will note I did notice allot of meteorites around that time. I don't know if there's any relation between the two. I also saw part of the sky turn dark orange for about 10 mins a few years later as well

originally posted by: Arcadiaestate
I've wanted to post about this for a long time. But I've also seen this happen at least 2-3 times on separate instances. This happened about 5 years ago so my memory isn't the clearest but it was defiantly in the summer time somewhere between 8-12pm. The flash covered at least a quarter of the sky. No sounds heard and clear sky's.

I will note I did notice allot of meteorites around that time. I don't know if there's any relation between the two. I also saw part of the sky turn dark orange for about 10 mins a few years later as well

Sounds like a bolide (large meteor) or even "heat lightning".

Just wanted to pitch in and state for the record that I've seen these flashes as well. Actually, me and a friend did. We were both skywatching and sometimes saw the same flash, pointing out to eachother where we saw it (you kindof have to look at the right part of the sky to really see them).

Here's a video the pretty much illustrates what they look like: