A white light in the night sky brightened, faded, maneuvered unlike a star/plane/satellite and disappeared.
It was around 22:45 on the night of 07/14/11 and my friend and I (both actors and musicians in our 20s) were outside smoking a cigarette. I looked up at Orion’s Belt and noticed what I thought was a star moving North Northeast at a smooth, steady pace. The light was the same color as the other stars in the sky, a bright white with no flicker. As I inspected the light I noticed that it was too high up to be a plane around Dallas (my house is right underneath the regular flight patterns for incoming planes into Love Field and DFW Airports) and it was moving too slowly to be a shooting star.
I thought it might have been a satellite due to the size of the light and the steady speed, but after 10 seconds the brightness swelled (not like a flash, but like someone manually changing the intensity of an indoor LED light) and dimmed back down, with the light beginning moving in a small zigzag or spiral pattern before it disappeared. To me it looked like it just faded out of sight but my friend saw the light get smaller in the sky until it was completely gone about 8-10 seconds later, like it shot up into the sky at speeds unmatched by man-made craft.
The entire encounter took about 20 to 30 seconds and occurred just below Orion’s Belt from our position.
((NUFORC Note: We believe that the Orion Constellation is not visible during the summer months. Object sighted may have been the reflection from an Iridium satellite. PD))
It was around 22:45 on the night of 07/14/11 and my friend and I (both actors and musicians in our 20s) were outside smoking a cigarette. I looked up at Orion’s Belt and noticed what I thought was a star moving North Northeast at a smooth, steady pace. The light was the same color as the other stars in the sky, a bright white with no flicker. As I inspected the light I noticed that it was too high up to be a plane around Dallas (my house is right underneath the regular flight patterns for incoming planes into Love Field and DFW Airports) and it was moving too slowly to be a shooting star.
I thought it might have been a satellite due to the size of the light and the steady speed, but after 10 seconds the brightness swelled (not like a flash, but like someone manually changing the intensity of an indoor LED light) and dimmed back down, with the light beginning moving in a small zigzag or spiral pattern before it disappeared. To me it looked like it just faded out of sight but my friend saw the light get smaller in the sky until it was completely gone about 8-10 seconds later, like it shot up into the sky at speeds unmatched by man-made craft.
The entire encounter took about 20 to 30 seconds and occurred just below Orion’s Belt from our position.
((NUFORC Note: We believe that the Orion Constellation is not visible during the summer months. Object sighted may have been the reflection from an Iridium satellite. PD))
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Off
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Plano
USA
20 seconds
20 seconds
33.04
-96.72
light
TX
Occurred : 7/14/2011 22:45 (Entered as : 07/14/11 22:45) Reported: 7/15/2011 12:24:11 PM 12:24 Posted: 7/17/2011 Location: Plano, TX Shape: Light Duration: 20 seconds
A white light in the night sky brightened, faded, maneuvered unlike a star/plane/satellite and disappeared.