I went out for maybe 20 minutes. In previous years, I typically
think I see a few, but maybe so dim I'm not sure, but then if I stay out long enough, will usually catch something pretty obvious.
Last night, I didn't see any minor flashes at first, then 15 minutes in a very bright one, with a path that would cross about 2-3 feet at arm's length. One more minor flash, and I went in. Nice night, and despite all the rain we've had, no mosquitoes (haven't figured that one out)
We were out looking early this morning and saw some kind of explosion in the sky. That was totally unexpected. We did see one other meteor, but the explosion was spectacular.
Iridium flare perhaps? Enter your GPS co-ordinates here, and you can see if one appeared in your area. They can be very bright (brighter than any star, well other than our Sun), and last about 10 seconds, fading in-out. They are reflections from the 3 rotating antenna plates on every Iridium satellite (used for the satellite phones).
Each reflection only covers a few miles of the Earth, and dims outside that area, so they need your specific GPS co-ords.
But they can also occur outside of that schedule. There are some out-of-control satellites that might reflect, but they don't have good enough data on their paths to predict the flares.
Heavens-Above
-ERD50
