SIGHTING: THOUSAND OAKS, CALIFORNIA (UNITED STATES)

Witness Testimony

"First, i am an avid sky-watcher and have been deeply interested, and have studied ufo sightings for a long time. i have seen, and can identify planes at night.. and do not mis-identify a plane for a ufo. for example, i know that planes on approach (moving directly towards the observer) can appear very bright and seem to hover. other times you may not see the red & green lights, but only a red light due to the distance, or the angle of the plane. i know helicopter lights, have seen countless satellites, as well as meteors. i know many constellations, and know what planets are observable in the night sky at all times. what i am about to explain is none of these. also.. this is my first post to mufon, and the first time in all my years where i have seen something and cannot explain. i can't say this is extra-terrestrial.. only very different from what i have ever seen. this is not a fantastic sighting.. merely very odd. at approximately 9pm on 8/4 i observed a flash of white light in the sky out of my bathroom window. it was brief, and did not reoccur for several seconds after. i watched the section of sky for about 10 seconds and the light appeared again, then vanished. this time i believe the light was white and some red. i quickly went outside to the back yard as i knew this was not a normal object. it took about 10 seconds to get to the back. once outside i saw the flash again and told my wife to come out and see. from this point on both my wife and i observed this object together. upon first seeing the object it was at approximately 335 degrees (nw) in the sky, and within the vicinity of the constellation ursa minor. it traveled in what i believe was a straight line, and the last i observed it was at about 35 degrees (ne) of me.. just to the east of the constellation cassiopeia. there were no clouds in the night sky and it was very clear. the lights were not like a satellite, plane, or helicopter: the object would either emit a single bright flash (like a strobe), or phase in and out. each time there was approximately a 10-15 second delay between flashes. at times when it would flash it was very dim and hardly observable, but at others (usually when it would flash like a strobe) it would be as bright as the planet jupiter (about a -2.5 magnitude). each time it emitted light it was a bit further along on its path towards the east. object speed: the speed of the object did not match that of a plane, or satellite. it took approximately 12-15 minutes to travel about 60 degrees (335 to 35) across the night sky. in my experience if this were a satellite it would have taken half the time or less to travel this distance... and most certainly if it were a plane it would have traveled that distance much quicker. in summary - the speed did not match any object i have formerly observed, and the flashing was also very odd. other than that the sighting was quite benign. odd though. i have attached a video of the object. you can only see it a couple of times when it flashed.. it was difficult for me to determine if this object was within the field of view of the camera since it was not a constant light. you can see it flash at :20, :40 and 2:40. "