Witness Account

Numerous lights were appearing then disappeared and would appear again. These lights were moving independently of each other and sometimes crossed paths. This was occurring at 4:11 am to the South East of my home at Magic Reservoir Idaho. Above the ridge line of the Clay Bank Hills, slightly to the South of Wedge Butte. It seemed these lights would be over the area above Richfield Idaho. I witnessed this again repeatedly for over one half an hour with binoculars. I first noticed these lights while on my couch, through my glass front door, with the naked eye, but I soon used my binoculars and more lights in the group became visible. Up to six lights were involved and were not aircraft in my opinion, due to this area of the sky being on the approach to Friedman Memorial Airport from the South. I frequently see singular inbound aircraft for Friedman Memorial airport (KSUN), in this area of the night sky and they always move predictably from South the North, or right to left from my vantage point, with the expected strobes and position lights that aircraft display. Also aircraft have their landing lights on, which give a headlight type of appearance, that changes with the position of the aircraft. These lights I witnessed, were single points of light that were grouped together, but separated like stars, however they would move rapidly in different directions. They clearly were not satellites, but in the night sky perhaps at ten thousand or so feet altitude. I personally own and fly an aircraft in this area, so my understanding of how aircraft appear in the night sky is well documented. Again, this is the approach to a busy airport in Hailey Idaho and aircraft always approach from South to North. I don’t believe multiple aircraft would be operating in this airspace, in a group this closely spaced. These lights were not aircraft. It is common in the night sky in this area, to see stars on the lower horizon. These lights stood out against the visible stars due to their rapid movements and also because they would fade away in brightness only to reappear. All the lights I witnessed, had visible movement independently of one another. Their movement seemed to be from the North East to the South West and back to the North East. Some up and down movement was also apparent. What caught my attention in the first place, was the unusual horizontal track of these lights, that was contrary to the movement of aircraft I frequently see operating in this region of the night sky. The speed of the movement of these lights appeared to be about the same relative to one another. These lights would stop and change direction back and forth across the sky. The hour of the morning made it unlikely for aircraft to be operating in a group. The color of these lights was identical to the background stars and about the same diameter as the visible stars. However they would visibly dim and grow clearly visible again as though clouds or fog was obscuring their flight path. It could be they were going out entirely and reappearing again. I’m certain they were not Starlink satellites. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this exact phenomenon in this region of the night sky. The last sighting was earlier in the year and more to the North than this most recent sighting. I would place the last sighting more in the location over The Craters Of The Moon Monument. The reason I felt the need to make this report, is this multiple sighting of identical light phenomena in the night sky, in approximately the same region of the sky. The previous sighting and this most recent one were identical in every way.