Seeking an explanation for strange light I just witnessed

Hello,

I'll begin straight up with what I just seen.

I live in rural Australia and over the years I have seen a particular aerial oddity in the night sky that always appears in a south westerly direction.

It appears as a very big and bright light, often yellow or white, and the time before this sighting their were multiple lights of a deep orange red colour.
They always behave the same. It was moving VERY slowly and would fade and dim out to just a tiny prick of light in the sky, then completely vanish. Within a minute it will fade back in again till it is a giant bright light again, the size of a very bright planet.

It will do this on and off until finally it fades completely out and doesn't reappear. The timing between fading out and fading in is not consistent... It might fade out very slowly over a ten or 20 second period OR fade out in a 2-5 second period.

I should note that it is a very clear and starry sky with no clouds, and the surrounding stars are not behaving the same.

The same goes for the time that it is totally vanished. It might be gone for a minute or more before reappearing again, sometimes less.
I don't think it/they are flairs.. when it is fully lit up it has the brightness and consistency and colour of a bright planet.

Tonight was unique in that there was someone off in the distance with a spotlight who was intentionally beaming their light up into the sky, obviously trying to get the attention of the object.

Does anyone have ANY idea what this actually is or have they seen something similar? I'm very puzzled

reply to post by Nomad451


At what time does it first become visible, and at what time does it begin to disappear? Since when have you started noticing this phenomenon?

reply to post by Nomad451


soundslike an irridium sattellite. they will get real bright , go out , then light up again. probably a lot brighter in australia

reply to post by Nomad451


well I am not sure if it is anything like you mention but I used to count about 10 rockets a day & night from Woomera area.

out of sheer boredom I would just watch them and count and even time it to see how long the rocket would stay visible to my eye.

rockets are fired day and night, perhaps that is what you have seen?

reply to post by sd211212


I haven't heard of an iridium satellite before so I will definitely look that up, thank you

Originally posted by DJW001
reply to post by Nomad451

 

At what time does it first become visible, and at what time does it begin to disappear? Since when have you started noticing this phenomenon?

I first noticed it tonight at around 9.30pm driving home from work. Once i got home I stood and watched for about 15 mins before it vanished entirely, I have no idea how long it had been in the sky before I noticed it.

The irridium satellite suggestion is interesting, but I have seen plenty of ordinary satellites before and this thing definitely moves a lot slower through the sky than an ordinary satellite.

Everytime I see a sattelite it has always taken around a minute or 2 minutes to cross the sky and disappear. This light I am seeing will stay in the same general expanse of sky for up to 15-20 mins before fading out and not returning.

I first seen this light about 5 years ago, and I have witnessed it about 4 times. The time before this last sighting which was about 2 years ago there were 3 red orange lights in the same direction that would behave in the same strange fading in and out manner.

interesting thread, although you say "rural" you don't say where in australia...was just curious as to whether you would be around the location of the recent quake, Amata area? ( hope my spelling is correct.)
I have read about Earthquake lights before.... and would this have any bearing on what you have seen?
I believe these earthquake lights have been photographed, but there is no scientific explanation as to what exactly causes them.

Peace


www.jimonlight.com...

reply to post by cosmickat


Northern Victoria is where I am located.

If these lights are within our atmosphere and only a short distance up then they appear over bushland.
I get the impression they are within our atmosphere and not in space.

We don't get earthquakes where I am.

ah..ok
I think the EQ was Northern Territory/Alice Springs area, so well away from where you are.

Are you in a good location for the Southern Lights? Lately there seems to be a big buzz going around about solar / electromagnetic activity and areas getting aurora activity who would normally not be fortunate to witness this spectacle?

Nature never fails to amaze and surprise us, but unfortunately for us always leaves us with questions as well as wonder.

yeah that does sound like a satellite but it was interesting that you said there were more than one. meteor shower maybe?

reply to post by eyesontheskies


it was a plane!

An Iridium satellite would appear to visibly move. Since you described it a being stationary, it was probably not an Iridium.

A geostationary satellite on the other hand, would always appear to be in the same place in the sky when viewed from a specific location. If it was rotating (which some satellites do), then parts of it may catch the sunlight and reflect it back to your eyes, so it could appear to brighten, then fade, and so on.

That would be my guess as to what you saw.

I'm not sure what to make of your sightings, but if it is a satellite, you should be able to figure it out by using this site:

spaceweather.com...

Originally posted by FireballStorm
An Iridium satellite would appear to visibly move. Since you described it a being stationary, it was probably not an Iridium.

A geostationary satellite on the other hand, would always appear to be in the same place in the sky when viewed from a specific location. If it was rotating (which some satellites do), then parts of it may catch the sunlight and reflect it back to your eyes, so it could appear to brighten, then fade, and so on.

That would be my guess as to what you saw.

Very interesting! I think this could explain it.. Definitely the most plausible. Seeing multiple lights doing the same thing at the same time only casts more questions but I don't see why more than one of the same satellite type couldn't be visible at once.

I appreciate the responses.. At least I have somewhat an idea of what they could be. I'm going to go out tonight and keep an eye out, I don't have a video camera, only my iphone 4s camera which doesn't have a zoom function when taking video Hopefully I see it again.

I have installed a satellite and aircraft tracking app on my phone and if I do see it again I will put this to use.

Cheers guys

reply to post by Nomad451


Sounds very similar to this.....

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Hi,

For what it's worth I experienced a similar thing, sort of.

I live in the UK and my rear garden faces south west and there is virtually no artificial lighting.
Tuesday evening about 8.30pm I went outside with the dog and noticed the stars in the clear sky.
Just like you SwissMarked I looked at Venus and Jupiter, ever so bright to the west, and admired Orion, my favourite constellation, and then checked out Mars to the east.
I check round occasionally for satellites and looking around I noticed a "star" due south west that seemed to be twinkling "funny", seemingly in different colours, as you describe SwissMarked with red, blue, white etc, the colours seemed to be flashing in sequence and each colour was eminating from its own "side" of the "star".
At first I thought it was the navigation lights of a stationary helicopter in the distance or a very high plane - but it was stationary for too long.
I wear glasses so I suspected that my glasses needed cleaning which I went inside to do, I also picked up my binoculars, when I looked again, the "star" was still there and still twinkling "funny".
Looking through my not too powerful binoculars help me see the multicolour effect a little clearer, and I knew it was not a usual optical effect.
I looked away from the "star" briefly to look at other stars to see if they were now twinkling in the same fashion, but none that I looked at were showing the same appearance.
When I looked back at the funny star, it had gone.
It had been obscured by a small cloud, but there were no other clouds in the sky.
I am aware that clouds can form for different reasons in just a few seconds, but it isn't the sudden appearance of the cloud that bemused me, it was the wierd multi-coloured twinkling of the "star".
Atmospheric anomalies, ice crystals and the like are usually blamed for strange events such as this, but I cannot understand why the anomaly was confined to just one "star".

reply to post by Nomad451


You might be interested in this similar case that I came across:

In response to "Mystery flashes" letter Pop Astro

I have to admit, having re-read your post again, and seen that you wrote "very slowly", makes me think that perhaps they were not geostationary. Having said that, it depends what they were moving in relation to. The stars or the ground?

If it was indeed moving very slowly, that might suggest that it was a satellite or junk at unusually high altitude compared to most.

Also, some satellites operate in pairs or even triplets, which may explain synchronized glints/flares.

I think you should also consider the possibility that it may have been still/geostationary whilst only appearing to move. It's not unheard of for people to perceive motion where there is none when observing objects in the sky.

It shouldn't be too hard to prove that they are not moving if they are geostationary. A good camera (DSLR) would be more accurate, but you could easily rig something simple up that would do it in a pinch. Just find a fixed structure or tree, that has a point of reference you could use on it. That will be the front of your "gun sight". Then locate the mystery object and position it so that appears just above your point of reference.

Now you need to make your "rear sight" which also has to be firmly fixed to the ground. You could use something like a stake or sturdy cane driven into the ground. The point is that is must be aligned with your front sight and the mystery object. This might take a little trial and error, but once it's all in place, then you can come back at some point later and see if the object has moved away from where your sight was aimed at. If it's truly geostationary, then it should be in the same position you saw it previously.

reply to post by Nomad451


What causes the air to light up around a UFO ship.
High voltage waves will do the job.
Also been thought to power the ships.

I live in the United States and you described exactly what I saw tonight. I was wondering if the light you saw also changed directions, the object I saw appeared to change directions.

i think i just saw what you saw, and ended up here looking for an explanation. im from connecticut, usa, and saw a bright orange/yellow light that disappeared in about a minute, then reappeared, and keeps doing that. the only thing different you said was that you didnt include that it somewhat moves, but very slowly, i only noticed after about 5 minutes, when i noticed it looked much more to the right of the tree that it was originally behind. i was just hoping i could maybe provide more information to figure out what exactly it is. i first saw it at about 10:45pm in the south east part of the sky

Hello I've come here for the exact same reason, I've seen a few unusual activities in the sky over the years, but after last night I'm almost convinced something very unusual/unknown is going on. I'm in the UK and a few times in my life i have seen this big bright light in the sky, which can be very high up. It is not a plane because it stops in the sky and tends to just linger around at a specific location.

Over the past month i have seen 2 of these events, including 1 last night which really had me intrigued for a real explanation. I was in my garden just smoking and noticed this bright light in the sky, it was dark with a pretty clear sky and it was completely silent. Upon noticing the light and just glaring at it for a bit, i soon realized it was moving across the sky, then upon noticing it's movement for about 5 seconds the light suddenly went ALOT brighter (By far the brightest thing in the sky) then dimmed down to original state again and then completely dissipated a few seconds after. This whole thing happened quite quickly, but from the distance and brightness of the light (although i don't have specifics) i cannot accept this object be anything other than a deliberate aircraft of some sort, with powerful light output. (was not a meteor or satellite)

Whatever this thing was the light changes were very strange and dramatic. It sounds silly but at the time it just felt like it knew i was watching it. Due to it's 'reaction'

Also I'm wondering what people can do in the event of actually witnessing something unknown? is there a way to forward information and get a genuine clarification? While i don't have it now, i will be focusing on time, locations and velocities on noticeable things, in the event of this strange behavior happening again.