What could Dāv Kaufman's UFO be? [Likely Solved - lights on the horizon]

[flarkey]

Why did you use a target height of 150ft?

It was a rough guess of the height of the buildings at the mine.

 

[fizzBuzz]

It seems this facility is very close to the horizon from the observation point, or just below and we're seeing refracted lights. But it looks like we have a likely explanation.

 

[jarlrmai]

Wow. Broken Arrow was an old TV show I watched as a kid. You never know what my stutter will bring up.

Broken Arrow is the code name used for a missing nuclear weapon or accidental nuclear explosion by the US military as well and there was a John Woo movie based on that premise with the same name.

 

[Z.W. Wolf]

I was at work all day thinking about this, and I was going to come here and say I was leaning toward a localized cluster of ground lights. But I'm way behind the times.

What I was thinking about was this video. Very similar appearance.
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/as...with-several-orb-like-uaps.14680/#post-360236

I've previously speculated that the strange lights in this video are lights on a distant ship, below the horizon, made visible by an atmospheric refraction effect.



narration

....disappeared before like one by one. The lights went off and now they're back on.

And they're just like hanging out, out there and that is pretty freaking big.

That makes me suspect the lights are over the horizon and are visible only when the conditions are just right.



At this point the lights fade out. Then at 3:55 they come back again. Probably because there's stronger or weaker refraction, depending on the changing conditions.

They're getting like closer and there's more of them.

Witness perceives increase in apparent brightness and apparent size as movement along his line of sight. Getting closer.

 

[Z.W. Wolf]

Broken Arrow is the code name used for a missing nuclear weapon or accidental nuclear explosion by the US military as well and there was a John Woo movie based on that premise with the same name.

All true. But this is what I saw all those times as a kid.

 

[Ann K]

But this is what I saw all those times as a kid.

Damn, ZW, you're nearly as old as I am! That was my little sister's favorite show.

 

[Mick West]

Sitrec is being a pain, slows my computer right down and wont let me get the camera low enough 0ft AGL is still ~10 feet up or so

@Mick West not sure if you are working on anything?

Sorry, yes, lots of new things going in. Can you share the sitch that is slow for you?

 

[Jay Y]

Broken Arrow is the code name used for a missing nuclear weapon or accidental nuclear explosion by the US military as well and there was a John Woo movie based on that premise with the same name.

Source: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=b1Z1uRZP0no

 

[Minus0]

View attachment 89894

There's a faint but visible in several portions light here that maintains distance and level with the main light cluster, which would seem to support a fixed location

The nighttime satellite imagery confirms the mine is very bright. Here's the clearest image during the timeframe of Dav's trip.

A few nights before, light cloud cover accentuates the brightness even more:

https://worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov/?v=140.38177527283088,-33.13458549375089,141.82036342047493,-30.736938581010843&l=Reference_Labels_15m,Reference_Features_15m(hidden),Coastlines_15m(hidden),VIIRS_NOAA21_DayNightBand,OCI_PACE_True_Color(hidden),VIIRS_NOAA21_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor(hidden),VIIRS_NOAA20_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor(hidden),VIIRS_SNPP_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor(hidden),MODIS_Aqua_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor(hidden),MODIS_Terra_CorrectedReflectance_TrueColor&lg=true&s=140.6654,-31.7435&t=2026-03-23-T01:09:55Z

*edit: the city of Broken Hill to the south-east has a population of ~17,500. So the light pollution from the mine is certainly significant.

 

[MapperGuy]

could this be the location? This is facing West.

https://maps.app.goo.gl/enLPH4dpY8LtDx5Z8
View attachment 89882
View attachment 89883

I think this location would fit.
The road in the lower night picture LOOKS like it is horizontal, but is actually sloping down, as you can see in the upper picture.
But the viewer at night cannot see where the HORIZON actually is because it is far away and the air is hazy/dusty.
So they estimate the horizon by where the road vanishes in the darkness.

Having lived in very flat areas the lights in the video look exactly like what I would expect a town/factory/building group seen at a great distance would look like at night in an area otherwise devoid of lights.
Through air that is not still but varies in density because of temperature differences.

Near a city like Tucson Arizona, where the lights go forever in every direction it is easy to see "horizontal" at night.
But out away from cities, where they are vast areas with no lights at all at night, isolated clusters of lights are hard to judge.