2014-01-01 - Salem, OR - Light

Six yellow-orange lights with reddish halos moving from NE to SW at midnight on New Year's Eve spaced about 45 seconds apart; no sounds

My wife and I went out on our deck about a half minute past midnight on New Year's Eve to watch some neighbors' fireworks. As I lookup up I saw a fairly bright yellow-orange light with a reddish halo around it moving silently from the NE to the SW.

My wife also saw it. We could not determine how high up it was as the sky was clear and there was no frame of reference. It did not seem to be a plane or helicopter as the light did not blink and there was no sound. It moved moderately fast covering perhaps a 45 degree arc of sky in about a minute.

As we watched, a second light came into view over our roofline from the same direction and on the same route as the first. It was about 45 seconds behind the first. Watching the first light, it dimmed as it got further from us, then was not seen. Changing to watch the second, a third light appeared, same time interval, same path. This occurred six time; six lights. Several of them seemed to change their course slightly to the south as they moved away. Because of our roofline, I was not able to observe where any of them originated.

I thought perhaps the lights were some kind of flares suspended from balloons - but they moved too identically for that in my opinion. Another thought was some type of crafts watching the firework displays for New Years. However, there were very few fireworks seen; our deck has a good view over the city. The only other thing I could think of was some kind of night maneuver with our local national guard unit - but I don't think our small unit has six helicopters. I have read some other observations of similar light sightings over the past months.