Flashes in the night sky

First off I hope this is the right forum for this.
Last night 1/22/2014 at about 8:30 Central US time I was laying outside watching the night sky. I do not know much about astronomy so bear with me. I was looking at the little dipper and about 2 inches (from my perspective) north north west from the little dipper I saw a bright flash of light. I thought it was an airplane but I didn't see any other lights again for about 5 minutes. In the exact same place about 5 minutes later was another bright flash in the exact same place. My wife came out with me after that and we saw a very bright flash in that same exact spot several times over the next 30 minutes. It got too cold for us so we came inside after that. At about 8:45 we saw a small fireball just south of the little dipper. Oddly enough we heard the loud booming noise again for hours last night as well.
Anybody have any serious ideas what we might have been seeing ? We both agreed that it looked like camera flashes but we were looking almost straight up in the sky so it could not have been towers or anything like that. It only flashed every 2 to 5 minutes and was always in the exact same spot so it could not have been an airplane or helicopter. I will try and find a sky map and pinpoint where I saw it and I will post it here shortly.

Could be Iridium Flares perhaps?
I see them all the times, very bright short bursts of lights in the skies.

Or, you know...

reply to post by Christian Voice

I have seen bright flashes if light as well... It happened a year or so ago, it was in September, getting ready to take my son to his Robotics class. My two daughters and I looked up and saw a flash of light. Then a few minutes later another flash but not in the same spot. Few minutes later another flash in the previous spot. Almost like the flashes were communicating with each other. It lasted 30 minutes and was gone when the sun went down. I haven't seen it since.

reply to post by zilebeliveunknown


Possibly... but Iridium flares move in forward motion. I have never heard of one staying in the same spot over a few minutes or so.

What noise did you hear again? The sky trumpets/sounds?

reply to post by zilebeliveunknown


I kinda thought that at first but the flashes were only a second or less, literally like a camera flash. Don't iridium flares usually last from a few seconds to a half minute or so ? These were very bright and never moved, not even a little over a 30 to 45 minute period. I guess it still could have been iridium flares but I checked a chart online and it didn't show where a flare was visible on the 23rd where I live so who knows. Also do flares flash as much as this did or is it just a couple of times ?

reply to post by Australiana


It was a steady boom, almost like distant bass from a rap song but never changed tempo, pitch or anything.

reply to post by Christian Voice


I seriously doubt you witnessed an Iridium Flare. That noise is very interesting. Were the flashes of lights you witnessed all of the same colour or did they vary?

Here is where I saw the flashes where the red circle is:

reply to post by Australiana


This is exactly what the sounds were like but a little more frequent. The noises were coming from the sky and seemed to be everywhere.
www.youtube.com...

reply to post by Christian Voice


Seen this last year in Scotland. Looked like lightning behind a cloud in the same spot. No noise. Flash intensity was high, lasted about an hour.

reply to post by EA006


Our sky was insanely clear last night. I say it like that because our sky is never that clear. The flash was from that one spot and looked just like a camera flash, it was intense.

IDK, maybe flares from satellites positioned in geostationary orbits, with lights fade in and out due to disturbance in the atmosphere.

When I was a teenager I was camping with friends one night when I witnessed the same thing, the sky was crystal clear and there was flashes every 10 minutes or so with no noise whatsoever. The next day it was in the local newspaper saying that it was a electrical storm, so maybe that's a possibility ?

Christian Voice
First off I hope this is the right forum for this.
Last night 1/22/2014 at about 8:30 Central US time I was laying outside watching the night sky.

Just to be clear - you live in the Central time zone of the US and last night you were laying outside? Wasn't it freezing cold?

reply to post by Galadriel


I rarely ever get cold. When I'm sick is about the only time I get cold. My wife had the heat cranking in the house and I had been cleaning and went outside to cool off for a bit. It was only in the 20s though.

I was at work having a break outside last night looking over the Huddersfield skyline and I saw the same thing an intense bright flash behind clouds but strong enough to make me go WOW!! no thunder and it didn't happen again, just like a flashbulb going off.
I thought maybe a supernova but I have not seen anything about one happening.

reply to post by boymonkey74


It's one of those things that make you go hhhmmm. I felt the need to look up and smile LOL. I would guess that in 45 minute's time we saw maybe 10 of the flashes. They were all in the exact same place. I wish my cameras would take good enough video at night to capture it .

The flashes are not UFOs, space rocks, whatever. They are high speed cosmic particles slamming into the upper atmosphere. This causes what is know as Cherkov light, which typically is a bright blueish flash of light. Depending upon the speed and altitude of the collision will determine the brilliance.

Rest tight, no aliens, space rocks, or NASA secret projects. Just science doing its thang!

reply to post by Scientist69


I could buy something like that if it was not in the exact same spot every single time and so uniform in it's frequency of it's happening.