2014-01-23 - Miami, FL - Fireball

Red "plasma" ball of light traveling south to north over the Everglades, complete with tail/corona.

Location: Miami, Florida (western suburbs, away from major light sources located eastward) (Note: This is the 2nd time in four months I have seen the EXACT same phenomenon in my location. I will include details of this event post-script. This was not a chinese lantern, as well.) I was sitting outside with a friend of mine. I glanced at the sky (Which I do out of habit), and my eyes focused on a single red dot of light. Instantly recognizing this as the same object I saw four months prior, I stood up and pointed it out to my friend. We stood in awe as the following happened: (Note: This event lasted over one minute) The object moved smoothly northward from over the Everglades (west from my location, about 5 miles from my house). As we watched, we noticed a whiteish-reddish tail emanating from the object, flowing smoothly away from it. The tail diminished, but given a closer look I noticed a corona of white vapor surrounding the red ball.

The dot of light and its tail resembled glowing red plasma. The object, from my limited perspective, seemed like it was moving as quickly as an airplane would from 30,000 ft up. I suspect the object was actually located between 50-70,000 ft high, and probably moving much quicker than any airplane. Despite this, it flowed smoothly from south to north over the Everglades.

After about 45 seconds, the ball of light dimmed... then reappeared three seconds later. It dimmed once more, then came back, now with a strong reddish tail flowing from it (at this point it was parallel to me if I faced toward the west).

Maybe 10-15 seconds later, my friend and I noticed the ball of light seemed to contain a small explosion, again very flowy and plasma-like.

After this final "explosion" of light, the object dimmed, then suddenly disappeared, now located to the north of me (i noticed the light when it was WELL south of my location).

We continued to watch the sky, but nothing.

Post-script: This has happened to me before. Same location, but this time the light was travelling from north to south over the EASTERN sky (from my perspective, I can surmise it was flying over the ocean, outside the mainland Miami-Downtown area). Again it lasted over a minute, it had a tail (this tail was much more prominent and strange than the most recent event. Very deep blood red, flowing well away from the ball of red light, creating what seemed like a Comet's coma/tail.) The tail would diminish occasionally, the light would dim almost completely, flash bright again, dim, flash, then disappeared.

I have studied meteors before in an attempt to explain this to myself. I believe with 150% certainty, NEITHER of these objects were a meteor or aircraft of any kind. There also seem to be many other reports of similar objects/events.

I write this in an attempt to perhaps get some answers or even a little logical explanation as to what this MIGHT be.

Note: Miami has very heavy air traffic, with various types of commercial, private, military and helicopter aircraft flying at any given time. During BOTH instances, other aircraft were in full view (I live near Miami International Airport. Planes do holding patterns or final-descent approaches near my house). This object did not resemble ANY aircraft or "chinese lantern" The first time, I had no witnesses. This second time, I have a legitimate witness that watched this happen with me.

Thank you.