Calgarians looking up around 8 p.m. Thursday may have noticed some unusual lights streaking across the night sky. Photos and videos of a group of lights filled social media, with those who captured the moment left wondering what they saw.
“It was from one end of the sky to the other,” said Forrest Hyslop, who was able to record video of the lights from his acreage northwest of Calgary. “It was pretty fantastic to see. I’ve seen shooting stars and stuff like that but initially I didn’t know what it was because it just lasted, it kept lasting.”
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Astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell believes the lights were those of Starlink 1723, which was launched in 2020. The satellite was removed from the Starlink constellation in October of last year and has been slowly de-orbiting since mid-January. McDowell says its path of re-entry was set to pass just south of Calgary Thursday night.
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Calgarians can expect to see more of these events, with 9,000 satellites currently being tracked, all of which will eventually come back to Earth, burning up and putting on a light show as they re-enter the atmosphere.
This happened for hours last night not March. It’s May. I kept waiting for thunder, cause I thought it was lightning. What is going on? I’ve seen sheet lightning. I’ve seen the northern lights. This was something else entirely. I was kind of hoping the aliens were here cause you know someone should be in charge. Kidding. Anyway, what happened last night what happened at like 11 PM till midnight last night in May? What is going on? And how does one get 9000 satellites to call them such a thing as a constellation up in the universe above earth. Why do we allow that? How does one just say I’m gonna put a satellite up there? I don’t know. I never think any of you were asking the right questions. He just kind of report like oh yes this has happened and then just don’t prove anything further I don’t know where the investigative journalist have gone, but they have all but disappeared. How unfortunate. Someone should be asking lots of questions not just like oh there was 9000 satellites that we’re crashing to earth and cause a lot of light. No one asked why 9000 satellites were in a constellation above earth in the first place like did someone say yes to that if so, who was that God? I do hope you get to the bottom of it considering your news was from March and it’s now May and it’s gone on for like a couple hours now and I don’t know if you guys are all asleep to notice. I’m telling you is this what we’re seeing or is it something else? Two let us know in the news at your earliest convenience.