People Go to These Strange Lights and Disappear, Here’s Why

There’s an unincorporated community Paulding in Ontonagon County in the state of Michigan. You can find beautiful nature, small houses, and dark forests. This place may seem boring to you but wait for the night. Here, in a valley outside Paulding, you can observe a mysterious phenomenon — glowing lights of unknown origin.

The first reports of the mysterious light appeared in the 1960s. A group of teenagers was walking at night along a country road surrounded by forest and noticed a strange glow ahead. The lights moved and disappeared. The teenagers told the local sheriff about what they saw. The police came to this place but found nothing.

Soon, other locals found out about it. They came here out of curiosity and also noticed strange lights. The mysterious phenomenon has given rise to many rumors and legends. Some say the light comes from a swinging lantern held by a railway station employee. More precisely, his phantom. Once upon a time, there was a logging area, and many trains transported wood from this place.

Others think it’s the light from a ghost train. Another legend says that one day a boy disappeared in this area. His grandparents searched for him along the railroad every day. Dozens of years have passed, and their spirits are still looking for their grandson. Of course, many people don’t believe in these stories and legends. Most locals are sure the mysterious light is swamp gasses or a kind of northern light.

The place has become so popular that people installed a special sign asking not to litter at the place where the lights are visible. While locals and tourists were speculating about what it might be, several students decided to conduct their own investigation. They proved that car headlights caused strange lights. The students brought a telescope and cameras.

One of them was standing where people were watching the lights. Another was driving a car on a distant road, where lights presumably appeared. The second student drove along the highway and blinked his headlights, while the first recorded the result through the telescope lens. Then they wait for the mysterious lights to appear.

When it appeared, students recorded it on camera through a telescope lens. The first recording, where a student filmed a car’s headlights, and the recording of mysterious lights were very similar. Moreover, through the lenses of the telescope, they saw the outlines of a car passing at a distance of 8 miles from the observation site. The group posted the telescope recording on the Internet.

The students also explained the flickering of the lights. They said that it had been cars passing through hilly terrain. The mountains’ location, air density, and temperature caused such an unusual light distortion. But many tourists and locals don’t want to believe it. They’re sure of the inexplicable nature of the mysterious light. You can come to Paulding and try to find the truth too.

We’re going to the UK and waiting for the night again. You’re driving along a long highway between small towns. The moon is shining brightly, and you’re moving off the main road. You pass through the forest straight to the swampy area. There’s no one around. You hear only croaking frogs and rustling leaves.

At this moment, a strange light rises up not far from you. It rises up over the swamp and flies in different directions. Then, the second one appears. It seems that a person is holding a kerosene lamp in their hand and waving to you. It looks like they’re calling: “Come here, come closer.”

Fortunately, you’ve watched enough horror movies and understand how dangerous it is to go to strange lights. But many didn’t understand this. People in the past centuries saw these lights and thought someone was stuck in the swamp. They went there, and the lights disappeared. And the “rescuers” couldn’t return, as they were stuck in the swamp. For many years, people have been observing this phenomenon. They call it “fool’s fire” or “spook lights.”

In the past, witnesses of this phenomenon were sure that fool’s fire was mythical creatures like forest spirits or elves who lured people into their swamp kingdom. But, with the advent of science, a scientific explanation appeared. Bioluminescent algae and fungi grow in such swampy places. Sometimes they glow with a blue color.

From afar, this creates the illusion of a small yellow light. The water sways the algae, and the wind can lift them up. Therefore, it seems that they are flying. Also, there’s a lot of methane in the swamps. This is a substance that appears in wet places as a result of rotting leaves, grass, and tree branches. When methane comes into contact with air, it ignites and lifts up like a burning ball.

We’re in West Texas now. A long road runs through the desert. People out this way often see big lights of yellow, blue, and red colors. They flicker, merge, and fly away in different directions. This phenomenon is called Marfa Lights. They appear several times a year under different weather conditions.

There’s no exact scientific explanation for this phenomenon, but there are theories. Some think it’s the headlights of cars passing on the neighboring highway. Others are sure that Marfa Lights also appear because of the release of dangerous gas. There are no swamps here, but large reserves of oil and natural gas in this place contain methane. Sometimes it comes out of the ground and ignites.

There’s a Brown Mountain in North Carolina where you can meet the world’s most mysterious and unexplainable lights. Lights appear out of nowhere and start flying around the mountain. This time it’s definitely not headlights from cars and not deposits of methane. These fireballs fly high speed over the top of the hill and disappear into the evening sky.

The lights appear not only at night but also during the day. People saw white, orange, and blue spheres. One of the witnesses claimed he had touched the flying ball while driving on the highway. He said he had felt an electric current. Now this place attracts thousands of tourists from all over the world. Fans of strange and unexplained phenomena like to come here.

Someone explained the nature of these phenomena by nitrogen emissions, but scientists didn’t find any emissions. Others claim this is an optical illusion. However, one physics professor decided to test the validity of this theory. He moved to live in the region where Mount Brown is located. Almost every night he spent in a tent nearby and filmed places on camera.

Once, he managed to catch these strange objects. In July 2016, he filmed the mountain with two cameras from different angles. And both of them recorded a flying fireball. If it was an optical illusion or glare on lenses, then one of the cameras wouldn’t have captured the light. This proves that they are real. But their nature is still unknown.

Let’s finish this article with the phenomenon that sailors observe in the open sea. You can see it too if you pick the right time. It would be best if you sailed far away from any shore in a clear sky. You wait for the sunset and look at the horizon. Its line is barely discernible. It seems that the sky and water have joined.

The sun is sinking lower and lower; at this moment, a bright green flash appears. It looks like the sun has changed color. After two seconds, the green light disappears, and the sunset continues. If you somehow missed this brief moment, you can wait for the morning. Greenlight sometimes illuminates the sky at sunrise. This natural phenomenon has a scientific explanation.

It happens when light passes through the atmosphere at a certain angle. The air bends the shape of the sun’s rays and separates them into different colors. The combination of these colors looks like a green flash. There are several varieties of this happening. The rarest of them is the green ray. Immediately after the sun sets over the horizon, a vertical green ray of light appears in the sky. This effect of a green flash occurs because of moist, foggy air. Still, it’s pretty cool!