A Very Strange Experience: We Saw 2 Massive Beams of White Light

I saw this too.. I large beam of light that ran roughly a west to east direction across the sky. It was coming from a single point in the sky that was hidden behind clouds it was not a plane or a helicopter. You do sometimes get sea rescue helicopters passing by but you can hear them miles off nor are they capable of making a light beam so large and long. .

This was not the Northern Lights I have seen the lights many times. The lights move or wave like curtains this light held steady. It was high in the sky above the cloud layer that obscured its origin.

I live in an elevated position surrounded three sides by water and we have the least light pollution in Europe. I am accustomed with the sky. This was definitely out of place but i cannot say what it was.

fluff007
reply to post by TrueBrit

 

Even second hand, such things are well outside my price range, otherwise I would probably be an awful lot more snap happy! Im stuck with my compact camera, until or unless I win the lottery or some nonsense.

Lololol...!! Me too..! I have been looking into getting some ex army gear. I have found a few things including proper night vision goggles and night vision cameras but they start from £150 upwards which is well out of my price range. The work season for me has ended. And the wages I have left have to tide me over til next April when work starts again. I am keeping my fingers crossed for my birthday..!

My friend has got a pretty good camera and it is not a compact but she lives on the mainland and I am not sure if she would let me borrow it for a couple of months.

I will find a way though and keep everyone updated..! Hopefully my partner will join in on this thread tomorrow eve...

What is the fascination with night vision goggles on here they are LOW RESOLUTION avg is 0.25 mpixel, they usually also have a relatively small zoom on most models max 4-5 times.

As for you beam was it light or a high level contrail as you were looking west and the fact you said it looked like it was miles wide.

reply to post by wmd_2008


It was miles across. The west point from which it originated from was lost in a cloud. Its point of origin was about 32 degrees elevation. It swept across the entire sky well above cloud layer to about 35 degree elevation in the east. That is some span. It was not a contrail this was not only long it was wide and when the clouds cleared it was brighter than the stars in the beams way.

astra001uk
spaceweather.com... was it like this? this was taken by someone who was waiting for the " northern lights "

From the link above a picture taken from Durness in Northern Scotland.

Strange Light

Went on to FlightRadar24 this flew over the area of the picture above about 25 mins before



At 35,000 feet it was high enough to cause a contrail and looking at the location on Google Earth the plane direction fits.

So I do think the op has seen a contrail.

reply to post by wmd_2008


This was not a contrail. I have seen contrails before and I have seen them at night. I have seen sun dogs, nocturnal clouds, northern lights and moon-bows too. This was something different. It was a bright beam of light that came from a single source behind a cloud and went from one side of the sky to the other. If it was a contrail you would expect it to be less bright and would expect it to dissipate across the sky with the atmosphere. This did not happen.

reply to post by purplemer


Myself and a friend saw this same beam too. We were camped up high on the Trotternish ridge on the Isle of Skye on the night in question. Approx 10:30pm I saw the beam of light and woke my friend up and got him to have a look from his tent. Neither of us could explain it. It looked like a super strong beam of light shining upwards, off vertical leaning slightly west, I would estimate it to have been north north west of Skye, difficult to tell exactly how far away but it could have been coming from the sea or an island (possibly Harris or Lewis) North to NNWest of Skye. At that time of the evening there was very high winds and a lot of cloud, the beam did not move and was visible through the clouds, whereas stars were not visible through the clouds. It appeared to be coming from ground level although we didn't see it coming from the ground as there was too much cloud blocking. We commented it could have been the Northern Lights though it looked more like a super powered search light, shinning straight up aiming slightly west of origin. It was not there later in the night when I next got out of the tent.

It looked similar to the images in the link on spaceweather.com posted by astra001uk, and similar to some of the links posted in comments at the bottom of the same page on spaceweather.com.

Afraid we didn't take any photos.

Forgot to mention - we only saw 1 beam of light from where we were.

reply to post by hounddoghowlie


Hi hounddog.. Thanks for the pics...

Well with the beam we saw the light was not originating from the ground. The light source was in the sky well above cloud level. But it was really frustrating as the bloody clouds were obstructing our view of the light source..!

I kinda doubt it was search lights. As the beam did not move around or change angle or anything. And it must have been in the sky for at least an hour...

reply to post by rufusT




Hi there rufus... No way...!

Well I have done some doodling to demonstrate where this was and what direction is was going in etc.. However the scale will be all approximate..!

Where abouts on Skye were you..? If you are happy to let me know I can add that position into my reference doodling stuff. Which I can upload to here to give peeps an idea of where and what this thing looked like..

It is interesting we are in the most North Westerly spot on Lewis and if you were on Skye then the beam might have well looked like it was coming from the ground. Will upload a some sort of pic of the beam I saw..

Hi Fluff007,

We were at Bealach Uige approx 290m above sea level, close to GR 443 642, approx 4km south of the minor road crossing the Trotternish ridge.

reply to post by rufusT


Hi rufus

Oooh that looks like a nice place..! Did you go there to traverse the Trotternish Ridge..? Looks like an epic mission. I haven't been to Skye yet... Determined to go next year. Hope you had fun...!

reply to post by rufusT


Please excuse my doodling skills...!! I only really know how to make things like this through Screenshots and Paint..

I hope you are ok with me plotting your points in the images..

Ok so first image is to show you guys where we are: myself and purplemer live on the peninsula in the red circle. You were on Skye, blue circle just a bit further North above where the 'A' pin is.. I also circled Lewis and Harris just so folks know..



2nd image: circled are the Military Base and the cluster of bunkers where we live - its a harsh place to live in sometimes but sometimes we get to witness awesome things..!



3rd image: in orange is the Flannan Isles where a 3 man team who were operating the Lighthouse disappeared in 1900. The disappearances are still a mystery today..! We could see the Flannans Lighthouse flashing just under the horizon of the sea and well below cloud cover. So the Lighthouse was not the cause of the beam we saw. In red again is the peninsula where we live. And I have attempted to show where the beam was originating and how I saw it. This is a rough sketch though..!



4th image: in purple is roughly where you were Rufus (I think - please correct if not), in blue is where me and purplemer were.. and I have tried to give you an idea of what I can remember the direction of the beam and the length we could see it to. This is not to scale.. It seemed clear that whatever the origin of this beam was hidden behind the clouds and you could see this glow in the clouds which we thought was the source..



We have a wet and windy day here today. But if it clears up I am going to take some photos and try to recreate what this beam looked like in the sky...

A bit more of the Flannans Lighthouse.. The official explanation was that a huge wave had come and taken the men away. But no one really knows for sure...

The first hint of anything untoward on the Flannan Isles came on 15 December 1900. The steamer Archtor on passage from Philadelphia to Leith passed the islands in poor weather and noted that the light was not operational. This was reported on arrival at Oban although no immediate action seems to have been taken. The island lighthouse was manned by a three-man team (Thomas Marshall, James Ducat and Donald Macarthur), with a rotating fourth man spending time on shore. The relief vessel, the lighthouse tender Hesperus, was unable to set out on a routine visit from Lewis planned for 20 December due to adverse weather and did not arrive until noon on Boxing Day (26 December). On arrival, the crew and relief keeper found that the flagstaff was bare of its flag, none of the usual provision boxes had been left on the landing stage for re-stocking and, more ominously, none of the lighthouse keepers were there to welcome them ashore. Jim Harvie, captain of the Hesperus, gave a strident blast on his whistle and set off a distress flare, but no reply was forthcoming.

A set of oilskins was found, suggesting that one of the keepers had left the lighthouse without them, which was surprising considering the severity of the weather. The only sign of anything amiss in the lighthouse was an overturned chair by the kitchen table. Of the keepers there was no sign, either inside the lighthouse or anywhere on the island.

en.wikipedia.org...

One last thing.. I am not sure what this was.. But I have never seen anything like it and I wonder if we will ever know what it was...!

Silly question I suppose and nothing to do with what you saw, but do you have broadband, sat TV etc? Just being curious, no offence meant....
Interesting about the lighthouse, think I read about that somewhere at one time..

reply to post by scotsdavy1


Hi there

Yes we have the internet.. Don't know if we can call it broadband. It is so slow..! May I ask why you ask...? Is it because we live in the arse end of nowhere...?

No offence taken..

reply to post by fluff007


No, nothing like that. I always wondered what it was like where you live to get internet etc. bad enough here in the mainland but just one of those things that go through your mind if you see what I mean.

reply to post by scotsdavy1


Lol no worries.. Yes we get internet but more and more folks out here are turning to satellite internet.. The broadband is just so slow.. You cant even watch a 20 second youtube video - its so frustrating...!!

We have been thinking of getting satellite internet.. Keeping my fingers crossed..

You can get Sky and Freeview up here too. But we do not own a TV.. And there is phone signal. Albeit it goes down quite a lot so is pretty intermittent which is a pain. But as long as we have one form of communication to the outside world we do not mind...

reply to post by fluff007


What a great experience to have! I wonder if anyone else in your area saw it and was able to get a photo?

Fluff--- I sent you a message. Mentioning it here because I don't think the msg alert thing works.

reply to post by fluff007


If you can get Sky then you can get Freesat no problem where you are then. Just put in a different postcode to get some decent channels.
Don't fancy your knock of the woods in the winter but must be good though looking at the sky at night as there won't be so much light as we have in the towns and cities here....

Come on, several witnesses and no one took few pics?

The only thing I can say about these latitudes as I don't know the Scottish one in particular, lots of strange things happen in more isolated places, away from civilization and on the north. Like Siberia - Yakutsk, idk if Alaska or Canada in general, yes some cases on the northernmost parts of GB too.. I've read some stories and IF there are beings, they are closer to the poles as being less inhabited areas.

purplemer
reply to post by wmd_2008

 

It was miles across. The west point from which it originated from was lost in a cloud. Its point of origin was about 32 degrees elevation. It swept across the entire sky well above cloud layer to about 35 degree elevation in the east. That is some span. It was not a contrail this was not only long it was wide and when the clouds cleared it was brighter than the stars in the beams way.

I wasn't giving a reply to YOUR claim I also live in Scotland only further south do you?

reply to post by virraszto


Yeah it was awesome..! There are a lot of weird things that happen up here in the skies. Who knows what it all is.. Well 2 of our friends and 2 of our neighbours saw it. Only our iPhone friend kept a photo I think.. I have not seen anyone today but will be asking around to see if anyone else saw it..!

Sent you a message back...