The first hand accounts of this event that I have heard tell me that the sparks from the tail were VERY bright. one account I have been given was that they "lit the place up like it was day", poor guy was shaken, he thought that he was witnessing a plane crash.
another account I have heard was that the light from the sparks was very bright on the video footage they saw (what was that question about CCTV footage?
)
so phoenix's account is quite reasonable from the reports I have heard.
Please bear in mind that this is hearsay from work colleagues, but they back up the 3 tailstrikes and the extremely bright sparks already mentioned.