WI, March 3, 2010 - Very bright light that filled the night sky

MUFON Case # 22128

WI, March 3, 2010 - Very bright light that filled the night sky.

We live outside of River Falls, WI which is rural farmland with woods and fields. Our house sits at the top of a bluff and we can see down into the valley heading east and south towards River Falls and points south and east which include Hudson, WI, Roberts, WI Prescott, WI, Hastings MN etc.

Our home is a multiple level home with our master suite on the top floor. I had been on the main floor doing some furniture rearranging when I stopped for a minute to go upstairs to our bedroom/bathroom. I was in our bathroom and happened to look up and out the windows on that side of our home which faces down into the valley, east and south as I just described. I often look out those windows when in our bathroom because the view is pretty at night, a black night sky with a few house lights far into the horizon in the valley.


As I looked out the window there was suddenly a very bright light in the sky, flashing, getting brighter and spreading in all directions. It filled a good part of the night sky and seemed to hang there, like in slow motion and it left me with what I call an afterglow, like one would get when a flashbulb goes off in your eyes. I did not hear any sound with it and I can not tell how close it was though I could swear it was right outside my window and over the several acres behind my house as it sweeps from the crest we are on and down into the valley where highway 65 runs north to south.

I did not notice a color but I was totally focused on the light and how bright it was and how big it was. I am not sure how long it lasted because I just stood there staring at it. For whatever reason during the time that I was watching it I did not give much thought to defining it. That came after I stopped watching it. I was mostly just in awe.

When it was gone I washed my hands and went quickly back down to the main level of our home and asked my daughter if she had seen it. She looked at me like ‘seen what’? I told her what I had seen and she said no I did not see it but I believe you. Odd thing for her to say now that I think about it. I looked out our rear kitchen window which faces the same direction as our bathroom to see if there was anything else and I did not see anything.

I turned the TV channel from CNN to the Weather Channel see if there were storms in the area because sometimes we do get thunder or lightening in the winter. Everything was clear winter sky for our area. I later took note that the stars were out which I had not even seen before when I was watching this light.

I went looking last night on the web to see if anyone else had seen it and then saw that there had been another quake in Taiwan in the same time frame. Nothing about lights in the sky. I have heard stories about how sometimes lights will appear in the sky before a quake because some kind of electromagnetic energy is being release but the quake was in Taiwan so I would not think we would be seeing lights for something like that here.

I was curious again this morning because seeing the light has stayed with me and I looked again and saw nothing till it occurred to me to look on MUFON and saw that someone else had seen it, or at least it sounds like they did. I checked here because I have seen odd things before and knew about MUFON but never reported anything on the website.

I was beginning to think it had been a transformer blowing on the hill. Now I know that is not the case because the other person who saw something was actually in town and from their description and would not have been able to see a transformer from where they were.

Maybe a meteor? It had to be pretty darn close to be so bright and visible if that is what it was, and there was no sound.

My feelings were excited, yet I was moving kind of slow. There was no fear, more like wow, that is incredible! What is that? Did anyone else see that? Was I the only one? I remember thinking it was something different. I think I am going to have to draw it if that is possible. I also remember thinking something about the earthquakes we have been having.

Thinking about this it makes me think of a light that our family saw in the night sky on a Friday night about a week ago. I know it was Friday as it was end of the week and no one wanted to cook so we were on our way to get a bite to eat. We were heading north and then west towards Hudson, WI on county road SS and I looked out my car window to the north and east as my husband drove and saw this strange light in the sky.

It looked like light that had been sent through a prism and you could see vertical bars of light touching each other all one color very pale. I asked everyone else if they could see it and we slowed down and pulled somewhat to the side of the road so that we could see it better. There were four of us in the car and all of us saw it. It was pretty big and high in the sky. We discussed whether it might be from a search light but it did not start from the ground up and nothing seemed to be around in the sky to make it. It was just there in the sky. I wondered about northern lights but it seemed to have too distinct a shape for that.

We watched it all the way into Hudson on county road U and then N till we got on highway 94 and headed west. On the way back we did not see it. The drive from our home to Hudson takes somewhere around minutes. I’m now wondering if anyone else saw that light too.

Our feelings/comments about this light were curiosity and we talked about what it might be and how odd it was.

I'd love to know what these lights were.