2010-06-25 - Oxford, OH - Fireball

Strange little fireball during International Space Station overpass

Just now, my father and I observed a glowing red and orange dot, traveling roughly southeast toward us from the northwest. We were outside watching the space station pass overhead, and while the space station was still visible, we observed the small red glow moving up from the horizon. It didn't look like a plane; it looked too big, and it wasn't blinking, although it did change from red to orange and yellow at inconsistent intervals. It reminded me of some very slow-moving meteor gradually fizzling out.

I suppose it could possibly have been the sunset reflecting off of a plane, although that doesn't seem likely either; the glow moved toward us across the sky for maybe 40 seconds, before finally seeming to slow, stop, and then quickly fade away and disappear. My father and I waited for a while to see if we saw anything that looked like a plane continuing along the same path, and didn't see anything at all.

Also, interestingly, I saw some very distant blinking lights that looked like those of planes, traveling right across and perpendicular to the path of that red glow. How they were traveling was weird; I saw one set of blinking lights move from east to west, I looked away, and when I looked back, there was an identical set of lights moving west to east along what looked like the same path. This repeated again; I guess I saw at least four planes traveling on almost exactly the same path in opposite directions, or the same plane changing direction three times. The lights didn't look like those of a helicopter and none of the flying objects made any noise.

I'm aware of Wright Patterson Air Force base being about 30 miles away, but it's northeast of my location unlike those strange lights, and I've never been aware of any strange flying objects before.