2003-02-26 - Dunsborough (Western Australia) - Flash

Several flashes from a stationary point source of light in the night sky seen over a period of time.

Whilst on annual leave staying in a holiday chalet in a small town in the South West of Western Australia I went outside for a cigarette. As there was little light pollution and it was a perfectly clear sky I stayed outside for a while gazing at the stars when a flash caught my eye. This flash had the appearance of a torchlight being flicked on and then off as it was white and round and comparable in size and brightness to the largest star visible.

I thought that it may have been the flash of a shooting star and so watched the same patch of sky (at approximately 60 degrees height from horizon with 90 degrees being overhead and looking in an Easterly direction) to see if there were any more. I saw the same flash again but in more detail and could make out that the light got brighter and then dimmed much the same as a lighthouse or revolving light seen from a stationary source with the duration of the light being approximately 1 second. There was no trail left as for a shooting star and no noise, nor any beam as from a searchlight, the light being in exactly the same portion of sky as first observed.

I continued to watch the same area and over the next 15 - 20 mins saw around 4 more identical "flashes", unfortunately I didn't time the frequency but it did not appear to be regular. The light source appeared to be at high altitude similar to orbitting satellites I have seen before but stationary and not a constant light.

Becoming bored standing outside I went back in to the chalet where several members of my family were watching television and when they asked me what I had been doing I replied that I was stargazing as it was such a beautiful night.

Around 15 minutes later my wife asked if I wanted to go for a walk to the beach "just to see what the stars looked light like at night". We walked around 80 metres and stood on the beach looking up at the stars when my wife asked me whether I had seen that. I said "seen what" and my wife replied "that flashing light" and pointed to the exact same area of sky. I still didn't mention I had seen anything earlier wishing not to biase my wifes thoughts and as we were looking we saw another two "flashes" over about two minutes. It was obvious that my wife was seeing the same thing as I was and that she had no explanation for a stationary flashing light source at that height with no noise.

I then mentioned that I had seen it earlier and had no idea what it was and we watched for around another 10 minutes seeing one more "flash" before my wife grew too cold and tired to continue watching. Once back at the chalet and now convinced I was seeing something out of the ordinary I stood outside for a further 30 minutes but gave up after only seeing one more "flash".

We are both professionals in our mid thirties and whilst I am interested in the edge science and ufo / extra-terrestrial fields I believe I have rationally discounted all possible sources of this light known to me.

Upon viewing the same area of sky the next evening nothing unusual was seen.