Mysterious Phenomenon Seen in the Night Sky

[Meliaveil]

TL;DR Summary

Dancing zig zag star

There is supposed to be a meteor shower tonight, so I was looking up at the sky, and saw something that at first I thought could be one, but it moved too slowly, so I watched as it danced in a zig zag across the sky, as high as a star, appearing as a star, yet floating slowly enough through the sky that it took about 15 seconds or longer to leave my field of vision.

I figured it must be a satellite, presuming that nothing natural would dance along in a zig zag motion like it did, but when I googled it, I found a closed thread on this site, indicating that satellites can't move in this formation either, and a lot of people were responding to the guy as if he was crazy, lol.

Unless there's a plane flying so high that it could look like a star?, if that's possible, with a tipsy pilot, I have no idea what it could be now, but mostly just wanted to indicate for the person who wrote the initial post regarding this apparent phenomenon, that someone else has seen it too.

I didn't think too much of it myself, and really it just looked like a beautiful dancing star, but according to everyone coming down on the other guy, this isn't supposed to happen, so just letting you guys know that something that looks like this does happen. Maybe by now, someone else has found an explanation and I just didn't look through enough search results, lol, but to the guy who wrote the other post, you're not crazy buddy!

 

[Filip Larsen]

Some possible candidates that cannot be excluded based on the few pieces of information you have included:

• Laser light show. Pretty much any motion can be observed from this, including speed and direction changes, full stops, reversals, multiple dots, etc. If there is a (thin) cloud layer it will appear as a dot or small disc that zips around. Since dot is restricted to a cone above the laser source the dot will appear to be restricted to a region of the sky when observed from far away.
• Landing light. Moves more or less towards you. Can start slowly and then slowly appear to move faster as it gets closer. Can change direction due to planes maneuvers to follow departure or arrival routes. If it gets close enough to the observer, or when changing direction enough, the navigational lights and the flashing beacon becomes visible. Also sound may start to appear.

Perhaps you remember where on the sky (relative to horizon) it started and ended in? How many times did it zig and zag? Zig zag implies change between two directions, was that what you saw or was there more directions involved? Did it zig zag the whole time you observed it? Was there any color? Was there any clouds that night (high Cirrus clouds can be near impossible to see at night, so I recommend using a weather service if possible). Do you mean by "leave my field of vision" mean the light went below your local horizon outline (houses/trees/ground)? Did anyone else observe the light and if so did they notice other things you didn't (or visa versa)?

As you can gather, I am not really trying to answer your question here but more trying to get you to think about the details of what you observed so you yourself can search for good explanations that fit this.

 

[berkeman]

Summary: Dancing zig zag star

I watched as it danced in a zig zag across the sky, as high as a star, appearing as a star, yet floating slowly enough through the sky that it took about 15 seconds or longer to leave my field of vision.

Welcome to the PF.

Most likely it was a satellite, based on the amount of time it took to cross your field of vision. The zig-zag motion was likely a common optical illusion, where your eye is making small motions and that appears to make the object / light move slightly. I first noticed this illusion when I was watching a small ant walk back and forth in small movements on a bland piece of concrete. There were no real optical reference points on the concrete to help me judge the small movements. After a while, I reached down to touch the ant, and discovered it was a small piece of leaf, not an ant. Since small pieces of leaves can't walk around in little zig-zag motions, it was apparent that my eyes were fooling me.

I did some Google searching just now to try to find a reference for this optical illusion, but mostly found other pattern-dependent visual motion illusions. I'll keep searching to hopefully find a name for this small zig-zag motion illusion (where there are not any good visual references near the object)...

Hope that helps.

 

[JCMacaw]

I'll keep searching to hopefully find a name for this small zig-zag motion illusion (where there are not any good visual references near the object)...

The autokinetic effect maybe?

 

[berkeman]

The autokinetic effect maybe?

Perfect, thanks!

 

[Klystron]

Also, Summer in North America can lead to interesting atmospheric effects including different moisture levels cited above. I have tracked aircraft that ascended smoothly on radar but jinked and blinked visually as the aircraft passed through different levels.

 

[phinds]

... as high as a star ...

You might want to give some serious consideraton as to whether you can REALLY tell if something in the sky is "as high as a star". I'm not even sure what that means.