[AZ-Observing] Re: West Phoenix Tonight
- From: Chuck <akersc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 23 Mar 2002 01:10:19 -0800 (PST)
The Air Force Thunderbirds are in town for Luke Day?s (Air Show) this weekend.
I was at Luke last night and although it was dark I could see what I believe to
be an F-16 flying around with a meteor like trail behind it. I?ve seen them
flying around in the daytime with smoke but the sparkling exhaust trail was new
to me and quite a sight close up.
David A Steiner <dsteiner@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Things do tend to fly around Air Force bases, but who can say for sure?
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2002 8:01 PM
Subject: [AZ-Observing] West Phoenix Tonight
>
> Did anyone else see the following or know what was going on?
>
> At about 7:30 PM tonight (Friday) I was set up in my observatory to take
> some comet pictures. As I was making adjustments what looked like a giant
> meteor headed down nearly due west. It was leaving a fiery trail. At
> spots it seemed to be exploding, almost like fireworks. Then just before
> hitting the ground it zoomed nearly straight up. This was going very fast
> and this side of the white mountains. Still leaving a fiery trail and
> what looked like explosions. Finally it faded. A few moments later
> another another one. This time it looked like it came from the ground.
> These may have been rockets from Luke. Then most strange of all another
> one took off did some gyrations like the others, but seemed to merge with
> something will flashing lights. Still moving at what would appear to be
> rocket speeds (way beyond what I have seen jets do, it seemed to slow and
> just the blinking lights remained. I watched this with binoculars (way to
> fast for the telescope) until it had traveled north for a couple of
> minutes. It then circled back slowly, acting like a normal plane at at
> normal plane sped, turned on a landing light and seemed to land. This was
> in the area of Luke AFB. I'm about 10 miles east and could not see much
> below tree level in the distance. My observatory is two story and I did
> get an excellent view.
>
> Did anyone else see this or have a clue what happened. It was very
> spectacular. I was thinking everything from a rocket attack to accident
> with missiles to the arrival of ET. :-)
>
> This all happened between 7:30 and 7:45 tonight.
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