Atmospheric ghostlights (will-o-the-wisps or hinkypunks, to use some older terms) are strange lights that appear in the air / sky at a distance (even close to the ground) without an exact logical explanation for their existence.
We’ve all probably heard folktales or stories concerning distant lights in swamps or marshes that lure unwary travellers into getting lost. These were the original “will-o-the-wisps” and may have been caused by the ignition of swamp gasses or perhaps ball lightning (though ball lightning is rare).
Some contemporary ghostlights include:
The Hornet Spooklight
On a rural road off Route 66 in North-East Oklahoma, a floating ball of orange light has appeared multiple times for 100 years.
The rural road is named the Devil’s Promenade and is 4 miles long. The ball of light, which is the size of a basketball, has been named the Hornet Spooklight after the former town of Hornet, and has been spotted in the night sky there since 1881.
What’s more is, the light dances and moves, spinning and bobbing up and down. No one is exactly sure where the light comes from or what it is. The light is usually seen from inside the Oklahoma border looking to the west.
A local man named Vance Randolph wrote about the spooklight in his book Ozark Magic and Folklore in the late 1940s:
“I have seen this light myself, on three occasions… It first appeared about the size of an egg but varied until sometimes it looked as big as a washtub. I saw only a single glow, but other witnesses have seen it split into two, three or four smaller lights. The thing looked yellowish to me, but some observers describe it as red, green, blue, or even purple in colour. One man swore that it passed so close to him that he could plainly feel the heat, and a woman saw it burst like a bubble, scattering sparks in all directions.”
Some people believed the light was the ghost of a murdered chief of the Osage tribe of Native Americans. Others said it was the spirit of a girl from the Quapaw tribe who drowned herself in the river following the death of her warrior-lover in battle, even though the Quapaw people were not native to that area of land and were forcibly moved there after the Indian Removal Act.
Locals say the best time to see the spooklight is between 10pm and midnight.
Some folks say the light is caused by swamp gasses, though that is unlikely considering the surrounding landscape.
The Paulding Light
This appears in Michigan’s upper peninsula just off US Highway 45, where people gather to view it on Robbins Road.
As the sun sets, small orbs can be seen up a hillside 5 miles away, varying between yellow, white, and red depending on the atmospheric conditions. They never increase or decrease in size but they hover then extinguish unexpectedly. They disappear when chased after or approached by anyone. They disappear at sunrise.
Folklore has it that the lights are from the ghost of a railway brakeman who was killed in a train crash. He appears nightly to warn people away with his signal lantern. However, there is no record or evidence of there ever having been a railway in that area!
Some people maintain the Paulding Light is a collection of will-o-the-wisps on the prowl for lost children. Other folks believe they are lights from alien spacecraft searching the treetops.
CCTV footage of light travelling down street
In the small hours of December the 12th, 2021, a CCTV camera outside a house captured some unusual footage of an orb of light travelling down the street.
The orb appeared from behind a parked car, then quickly dropped lower, prompting people to wonder whether it was a ghost.
So, what scientific explanations are there?
Ghostlights could be caused by flammable underground gasses (e.g. radon and methane) being lit by static electricity from friction between rocks during earthquakes or other geological occurrences. Sometimes the gasses can be trapped inside water droplets evaporated from the rocks as well, making them that much more visible when they ignite.
Another phenomenon known as piezoelectricity could be a cause. This is when electric charge builds up in solid materials (e.g. crystals like quartz, some ceramics, or bone) in response to mechanical stress such as earthquakes. (More about piezoelectricity here).
Some bioluminescent creatures such as fireflies can be mistaken for ghostlights, as well as “foxfire” – the bioluminescence given off by some species of fungi. So can meteors, campfires, and lights from cars, trains, or other vehicles.
And then there is ball lightning, a luminous sphere sometimes spotted during thunderstorms. It’s often red, yellow, orange, or blue / purple and varies in size. It lasts longer than normal lightning flashes, and its exact cause has not yet been determined. Ball lightning has sometimes been reported as having a hissing sound and a sulphuric smell once it dissipates. It moves erratically and can move against the wind (unlike normal lightning), sometimes hovering above the ground. It is considered dangerous, potentially able to cause burns or electrocution upon contact.
The most likely explanation for the Hornet Spooklight and Paulding Light is traffic headlights distorted by changes in the air density / air temperature.
The Hornet Spooklight is caused by car headlights on an adjacent highway, most likely refracted by the changes in air density and temperature over the Spring River.
In 2010, Michigan Tech University (MTU) sent a student expedition to analyse the Paulding Light. They used cameras, light metres, and high-powered telescopes and found it was caused by distant car headlights being changed by atmospheric effects to create a shimmering “mirage,” similar to how the air shivers above the sands in a hot desert.
Despite this explanation, there is still a belief that it wasn’t the true Paulding Light that the researchers saw and that it is still caused by something otherworldly. This is likely due to the persistence of “animism,” an ancient belief humans have held in the supernatural giving an identity or intelligence to natural phenomena.
As for the CCTV camera orb from 2021, no concrete theory seems to have been put forward. It could have been infrared light from the camera’s night vision bouncing off a passing insect or particle of dust / droplet of water (i.e. backscatter) but looking at the trajectory and apparent distance of the light from the camera lens, that doesn’t seem likely to me.
If you have an idea as to what was causing that orb, please drop me a comment below!
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