2011-08-16 - West Seneca, NY - Fireball

Strange orange-red fireball moving erratically, almost bouncing, several thousand feet in the southwest sky.

My girlfriend and I were in our suburban backyard, just southeast of Buffalo, NY. We just moved into the home one month ago. We previously lived in a country setting and never have I seen anything like what occurred on 8/16/2011. We were talking with our neighbor in our backyard and I noticed what looked like an orange-red fireball in the southwestern sky. It was moving slowly and without sound, it appeared several thousand feet in the sky, it was moving from the southwest towards the east. I asked my neighbor what it looked like, he said it looked kind of weird. My girlfriend saw it as well, she didn't know what it was. I commented that it did not look like any aircraft I have ever seen, nor was it shaped like an airplane, it also appeared to change shape and alter it's direction slightly up, then down, like it was bouncing or unstable, the movement was very quick. It also appeared that the color started to get brighter, then diminish, but not blinking. I guess you could describe it as looking like something on fire with erratic, non-linear movements. I would like to mention I was in the U.S. Army, my specialty or MOS was air-defense artillery. I was trained to recognize many, many types of military and civilian aircraft that were friendly and enemy. I spent years training for war and recognizing aircraft by the WEFT method, which meant wings, engine, fuselage and tail. I have been witness to many types of flares dropped from F-16's and other aircraft doing evasive maneuvers. This did not appear to be a flare or anything I have ever seen. My neighbor commented that it looked like a Chinese Lantern, but it was way too high up in the sky and too large to be something like that. Anyway, the fireball moved out of sight behind a huge cottonwood tree that was in our other neighbor's yard to our south. I waited for it to reappear on the other side of the tree but it did not. The duration of our ability to see this object was approx! imately one to two minutes. I walked into the street to try to! find it again but could not. It just disappeared. I would like to mention there are not any military airfields close-by or in that vicinity of the sky. The closest one is in Niagara Falls, about twenty-five to thirty minutes north of Buffalo. That airfield houses large transport aircraft, which I could easily recognize in the sky. Anyway, this "Fireball" was surely strange and without any sound. This is the first time I, my girlfriend, or neighbor have ever seen something like that.