Strange lights in Mississippi sky explained

March 24, 2021 ufos

SOUTHAVEN, Miss. – Mystery solved. A Southaven woman says she and her family members were responsible for the bright, yellow lights above their neighborhood that were mistaken for UFOs Sunday night.

Wanda Bell said she and several relatives set off 15 to 20 sky lanterns outside her house on Charter Oak Drive to celebrate the lives of loved ones they’ve lost over the last few years. She found out a day or two later someone had mistaken them for UFOs.

UFOs spotted in Southaven

“I thought it was joke but then I laughed because my daughter said it. She said, ‘What you bet somebody is gonna say they saw UFOs,’” said Bell

David Howell, who lives about four streets away on Bridgewater, spotted the lights late Sunday night when he went to get something out of his car. Struck by their formation, he began recording the lights on his cell phone and called his father outside to take a look. His video has since received some international attention.

“Everything went through my mind. Is this UFOs or aliens?” said Howell.

Howell and his father said they knew the lights were too large to be drones and said they appeared to be dancing in the sky.

While Bell doesn’t believe in UFOs, she said she can understand why the paper lanterns might have been mistaken for something else.

“When we released them and like I said, we were in awe because of the way they just lined up and they just floated and they went higher than we thought,” Bell said. “That might be why they thought that, because they went way up and you can see it was just the beautiful bright yellow light like a star.”

Howell said, on the one hand, he’s relieved to know the source of those lights, but he’s a little disappointed it wasn’t an encounter of another kind.

“It’s okay. That’s good. Maybe we are alone,” said Howell.

Howell said after he recorded the lights he put it all over his social media accounts hoping he would hear from someone else who saw the lights or could explain what he saw.