Wierd Phenomena

[Mich the Tester]

When I was about 7 I saw a pinky-orange, round luminescent object flying through the sky toward my granny’s caravan and my mate (who was there too) said it was ball lightning. Was it ball lightning? Was it an alien spacecraft? Or does my memory deceive me and was it a dream? Was it a collective hallucination brought on by the immeasurable tedium of a rainy holiday in Morecambe Bay?


Bear in mind, I have no idea where my mate lives now so I can't ask him if he remembers.

Skeptics and believers welcome.

[PRC1964]

Sounds like a frisbee or possibly even a space hopper.

[BrilloPad]

It was Zeity out for his morning ride.

[Mich the Tester]

Sounds like a frisbee or possibly even a space hopper.

Hmmm, no, it flew straight toward the caravan from some distance; we were standing in the back. It then flew very low over the caravan. There was nobody in visible distance throwing Frisbees as it was pissing it down. Spacehoppers weren’t luminescent in those days.

[Churchill]

Bear in mind that Warton is just south of Blackpool...

[Mich the Tester]

Bear in mind that Warton is just south of Blackpool...

You mean it could have been a stray missile? Bloody close shave if it was.

[Churchill]

You mean it could have been a stray missile? Bloody close shave if it was.

No, Warton build aircraft, weird and wonderful ones but not missiles.

[Mich the Tester]

No, Warton build aircraft, weird and wonderful ones but not missiles.

Then it was a very small aircraft. It was a little larger than a basketball. Anyway my uncle was an engineer at Warton. He talked about his work. Top secret, he said top secret!

[FSM with Cheddar]

On boxing day last year, a Chinese lantern flew over cheddar. It was orange, and was glowing from the candle inside it.

It looked really great on an ice cold day silently floating over the house.

Loads of people starting writing into the local paper about seeing a UFO. The discussion went on for weeks about the silent power source etc etc. There were people saying that they used to be sceptic, but after seeing it themselves they now believe.

I wrote in, identifying what it really was, and asked people to return to their normal sceptic self.

Perhaps it was the same thing?

[Mich the Tester]

On boxing day last year, a Chinese lantern flew over cheddar. It was orange, and was glowing from the candle inside it.

It looked really great on an ice cold day silently floating over the house.

Loads of people starting writing into the local paper about seeing a UFO. The discussion went on for weeks about the silent power source etc etc. There were people saying that they used to be sceptic, but after seeing it themselves they now believe.

I wrote in, identifying what it really was, and asked people to return to their normal sceptic self.

Perhaps it was the same thing?

Maybe it was. In fact it was the one wierd experience that really made me a skeptic. I have never believed the little green men theories, although ball lightning intrigues me. Unfortunately it's one of those mysteries that seems to attract a lot of loonies, so a really good scientific explanation of the phenomenon and a good description of how it looks might help me to clarify what I think I saw.

Equally, if it's just a faulty memory, I find it interesting to know why the brain would act that way; what evolutionary purpose is served by a memory that isn't real?