SIGHTING: BRIAN HEAD, UTAH (UNITED STATES)

Witness Testimony

"Yankee Meadows, between Parowan and Brian Head, Iron County UT. Was camping outdoors with family amongst trees, lying awake looking at stars through a clear patch of night sky overhead. Had been observing sky for quite some time (and was wide awake). There were two occurrences, one around 5AM, next around 20 mins later, very similar to each other.First noticed a motion amongst the stars. Object was moving in a fairly straight line but wiggling from side to side against a stationary star-scape behind it. The sky was dark and clear, stars highly visible with no clouds apparent. Location was almost straight overhead. Weather was calm, no lightning, almost no wind.Speed of motion across the sky was slightly faster than a satellite; Im somewhat familiar with artificial satellite having observed them many times and feel compelled to reject that as a possible explanation because of their motion. Not stationary man-made satellite would move in a straight line consistent with, say, an earth orbit with a ninety minute period or so, a fixed number of degrees traveled per second across the sky. The side-to-side motion would eliminate this possibility. It wiggled perpendicular to its direction of travel at a rate of maybe 2-3 cycles per second, a sine-wave like motion which didnt alter.. i.e., this wiggling motion was constant and did not vary in "amplitude" during its transit.This could not have been a low aircraft since, in dead silence it should have been audible. Also aircraft usually would have more than one running light, and often strobes; by contrast the light I observed was steady, did not blink, and its motion was inconsistent with aircraft. I dont believe it could have been high altitude aircraft; even the most high performance jet would not have been able to sustain that type of motion because of its inertia; and again the light was steady and did not vary in brightness.The brightness was similar to that of a larger of the artificial satellites, brighter than the dimmest stars observable but slightly less bright than, say, the dimmest star in Cassiopeia.Other possibilities Id find it hard to believe: spark from campfire (would have moved much less regularly, blown about by random winds; wrong color; apparent infinite distance); maybe ball lightning (sometimes observed after lightning strikes, I reject this idea since the weather was calm and clear and no lightning all evening). Most definitely could not be a star twinkling, scintillating, etc, since the motion against the background starscape (stationary) was so readily apparent.Second one (also alone) made an appearance about 20 mins later in nearly the same location, traveling in slightly different compass direction but with exact same motion characteristics. Lost sight of object when it was occluded by tree canopy to one side of field of view.Feelings/reactions - just had the instinct to observe and identify, quickly eliminate possibilities: most definitely not a star, unlikely it was satellite, almost impossible to be aircraft; concluded it was artificial but no idea at this point what it is. Apparent speed in degrees per second across sky would have been about, say, one thumbnail width per second at arms length.Highly unlikely it was light on a helicopter - to be low enough for that kind of motion it would have been audible, and also likely would have seen secondary effects. Also the side-to-side motion would be too dramatic for even a high performance helicopter.Unlikely it was a slow meteor - have observed such and those are very inconsistent with this steady consistent wiggling motion.I would like to know what these are! I would welcome any contact/explanation. I now have seen three in my lifetime, the first back in 1984 in Connecticut (3 witnesses). Have not rejected a possible scientific explanation, just want to hear other possible explanations."