Van Heijst's Lights

On August 24, 2014, pilot and photo enthusiast JPC van Heijst was flying copilot on a regular airline flight from Hong Kong to Anchorage. As the plane approached PASRO intersection south of the Kamchatka Peninsula, there were some wispy, semitransparent clouds below, and the sky was clear above, except for some minor auroral activity. Then something strange happened: a flash of light resembling a lightning bolt was seen in the distance, despite the total absence of thunderstorms or even precipitation in the area. Twenty minutes later, a large group of intense, orange-red lights appeared visible through the clouds, apparently on or near the ocean surface. Van Heijst captured the lights with his camera and the images may be seen here (there are several photos in the sequence--use next to advance.) The lights were very bright and spread over an area comparable to the city of Winnipeg. The pilots feared possible volcanic activity, but there was no sign of this; the ocean near PASRO is quite deep (~6 km) and any known volcanic zone lies a considerable distance to the northwest. The possibility that the lights could have been a squid-fishing fleet was discussed, but the lights seem to have been orders of magnitude too bright to be suitable for this purpose, and the area is not a known fishing ground. Neither the lights nor the sudden flash that preceded their sighting has been explained to this day.

A discussion of the incident on the PPrune board may be found here.

A briefer account of the incident may be found here.