Early on Jan. 19, several pilots reported "
multiple lights sometimes in a triangle formation(opens in a new tab)" high above the Canadian Prairies.
"I had a company aircraft over Thunder Bay suggest, he thinks it possibly could be satellites," an air traffic controller in Winnipeg told aviators around 4:45 am local time, according to audio obtained by CTVNews.ca.
"I'm certainly no expert, but they're moving side-to-side and then going away from each other and then forming triangles," an Air Canada pilot from Seattle to Winnipeg replied while flying over Saskatchewan. "That doesn't really seem like they're in any type of orbit. But I mean, I'm no expert."
"Yeah, it's quite bizarre," a pilot on a nearby Flair Airlines flight from Vancouver to Toronto added. "There's around six of them just randomly in formation flying at a high altitude at 12 o'clock."
"Definitely not satellites," a pilot on a Morningstar Air Express cargo flight from Calgary to Toronto interjected. "It's unlike anything I've ever seen in the 15 years of night flying that I've done."
You can
listen to their conversation here.
The 13-minute clip was culled from 2.5 hours of raw audio downloaded from two feeds at
LiveATC.net(opens in a new tab), a website that streams and archives air traffic control radio. Edited for length, the original conversations between pilots and air traffic controllers took place from approximately 4:20 a.m. to 6 a.m. CST.
"There's no active airspace, military airspace, anything like that we're aware of," an air traffic controller said on Jan. 19. "I honestly have no idea what that might be."
At least four aircraft reported seeing the lights that morning, including Flair and Morningstar jets, and two Air Canada flights. They estimated the lights were well above them, as high as 100,000 feet (30,480 metres), which is beyond the reach of most fighter jets. Two other crews also chimed in to say they've recently had similar sightings over Canada.
"I haven't seen them tonight, but we've been seeing those lights for probably the last 18 months or so, just for your information," a pilot on a Cargojet flight from Hamilton, Ont. to Winnipeg reported.
"Wow, that's interesting," a WestJet pilot flying from Winnipeg to Toronto replied. "I've had it but only ever going westbound, with three or four like that over the last month or so."
"I've never seen them eastbound, only westbound," the Cargojet pilot added. "And yeah, same thing too: movement all over, sometimes they make a triangle, sometimes they make a diamond and square. They're bright and they just appear all over."
"Sure be nice to get answers on that, for sure," another pilot said.