2012-01-12 - Saratoga, CA - Other

Flash of light that lit entire nighttime sky, traveling West to East. Followed by a power flicker of at least 25 miles.

Clear skies for Thursday night January 12, 2012 in Saratoga, CA. I was outside on the phone talking to a friend who lived approximately 25 miles north in San Mateo and was inside their house. Suddenly, I saw a flash of light across the sky almost instantaneous coming from a Western direction across the sky towards the East. The light was so fast that while I saw it I thought it was lightning but while the light flashed I reminded myself that we had unseasonably hot and clear weather with no rain for a month. Then once the light flash ended, all the lights flickered, street lights, neighbors house lights and inside lights and even our own house. I was talking on the phone while I witnessed this and said I saw a light flash across the sky and the lights just flickered off. My friend on the phone said that while I said this, their house lights flickered off and then on again. I would have thought this was nothing but a power spike, except that I saw the light a! cross the sky flashed in a flick of an eye. There was no object, just a flash of light across the entire sky as thought it was coming from the West (Pacific Ocean or San Francisco) area. The entire moment from the light across the sky to then the electrical energy bleep lasted 3-4 seconds. If you blinked, you would have missed the light across the sky. The electrical outage came after the light, and was a longer bleep. This happened again approximately 30-45 seconds later. However, this time the flash of light was barely noticeable and the power flicker only hit the street lights. I do not live near any electrical power center or any large electrical wires. What was odd is that 25 miles north my friend experienced the same thing, but did not see the light flash because they were indoors. There were no forms of evidence such as pictures, except that my friend witnessed the electrical outage.