Expert: Tom Whiting - 9/16/2009

Question
This evening around 9- 10 pm we also saw lights in the sky over Holden Beach on the southern end of the island. They were orange lights that appeared out of no where, sort of just came on and then went out. A few moments later it came back on again just in a different position in the sky,and then two other lights ,same color and size only slightly over in the sky. The strange thing about this is that last year we were here the same week and we saw the exact same lights last summer as well.  

Answer
Hi Carol,
It's summertime and a lot of reservists are attending their 2 weeks of required military duty training, generally the same time of the year every year, usually in September. (That explains the annual repeated activity).  The Carolina's are an ideal place for military maneuvers as it's comfortable and better than Niagara Falls or Buffalo in February.  So I'm sure what your seeing involves some kind of night-time Coast Guard or Navy or Air Force or Marine training, probably out over the ocean just south of your location, off the South Carolina coast, probably abeam Myrtle Beach Air Force Base.  I believe that's a designated training area over the
ocean just east of Myrtle Beach....for practice training....search and rescue missions at sea.

Being orange, sounds like you are seeing illuminated flares which come and go, as military
flares are orange in color, and can be seen well over 100 miles away on a good, clear night, when
they are lit at 3000 or 4000 feet high, attached to a little parachute to keep them aloft
for 5-10 minutes.  Also remember with lights at night, there is no depth perception...we can
only determine brightness, not distance or size of object. (The stars are trillions of miles
from us, some are huge giant stars, yet we can't determine their size or distance, unless you
have very specialized equipment like spectroscopes, etc... just by looking at them...we only see and can determine, their brightness.  Artificial lights at night are exactly the same way).
Even meteors...we can't determine their height or size or distance from one observer, only their brightness....unless you have multiple observers at multiple locations at the same time.
Anyway, that's my best guess.
Clear Skies,
Tom Whiting, former USAF Nam pilot,
Erie, PA