UFO-like lights in Wisconsin a firefly UAP event, investigation begins

Around the holidays, seeing lights just about everywhere you look is expected. But the ones some Wisconsinites saw speeding through the sky at the beginning of the month?

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Chris Nowak of Mukwonago.

UFO investigators have been looking into what the bright, white lights that several locals saw moving around the sky could be. Numerous publications have written about the sightings, including the Daily Mail, the New York Post and People. Nowak even appeared on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” earlier this week to share his experience.

Here’s what he and other Wisconsin residents saw.

A line of light racing through the sky, spotted from I-43 near Greenfield

Around 6:40 p.m. on Dec. 2, Nowak, his wife and their two young children left their house to go to West Allis’ Candy Cane Lane, one of their holiday traditions.

While they were on Interstate 43 northbound, his wife noticed something unusual in the sky.

“It was like a line of light that would basically pulse through the sky incredibly quickly,” Nowak told the Journal Sentinel.

There was “no rhyme or reason” for the way it was moving. It would go from one horizon line, all the way to the other. It would move from southwest to northeast. Sometimes, it would return in the opposite direction.

“It didn’t have any sort of like a rhythmic cycle to it or anything like that,” said Nowak, an educator.

The light would reemerge and race through the sky again and again every about five to 30 seconds, and continued throughout the Nowak’s 20-mile drive.

“We continued to see this pulsing, racing going through the sky the entire time,” Nowak said.

After exiting the interstate, Nowak pulled into a Greenfield church’s parking lot to capture a video.

When he looked up, there was a blue-ish/purple hue in the sky. About 10 seconds later, a white light emanated from within the hue, he said. Seconds later, the white light shot forward through the clouds and separated into three different points.

“It kind of reminded me almost of like if you see an air performance, like the Blue Angels,” he said. “And they do a maneuver where they come toward you as a single unit and flank out. That’s how I would describe this light.”

He said it would zoom “so incredibly quickly,” traveling from east to west, north to south. But it was always gravitating back toward the hue.

“It was just incredibly erratic,” he said. “I couldn’t imagine what this could be. It was different behavior from what we saw when we were driving.”

‘Playful’ bright-white lights seen in West Bend

The night prior to Nowak’s experience, Kimberly — who did not wish to share her last name — and her husband were driving east on Wallace Lake Road in West Bend on their way home from dinner. Kimberly, who has lived in that area for nearly 20 years, said it has acres of farm fields, dark skies and no light pollution.

After passing Wallace Lake Supper Club around 10:45 p.m., what looked like a white owl came from the top of the trees on their right-hand side, swooped down in front of their Jeep’s headlights and then to the top of the trees on the left-hand side.

“We’ve seen them before,” said Kimberly, a salon owner. “We’ve seem them pick up possum in front of our vehicle. So, this was like nothing new. They’re just so bright white.”

But then, it happened three more times.

“Now, we’re just like beyond what the heck is going on,” she said. “We’re starting to look out our windshield. What is flying in front our our headlights over and over and over and over?”

The couple pulled over to record a video.

“It was different patterns, doing different things, and kind of swirling around where you see them and just moving around the sky,” Kimberly said.

Minutes later, the handful of “playful” lights disappeared.

“It was entertaining to watch,” she said. “But it was hard to wrap your mind around what you were seeing.”

Since Kimberly’s dad was an Army helicopter pilot, she said she’s watched the skies her whole life.

“I’ve never seen anything like it before,” she said. “It’s definitely either something from outer space or some secret military thing.”

Witnesses say the lights don’t look like Starlink, spotlights, meteors or light shows

Nowak has seen the Starlink satellites that were launched by Elon Musk’s SpaceX to provide satellite internet service and have been mistaken for UFOs.

He’s also seen meteors fly through the sky; spotlights; and light shows at Disney World and Universal Studios.

“This looked completely different,” he said.

Nowak is a believer that there’s “a logical explanation” for everything. But he’s still looking for one here.

Nowak scoured Facebook to see if anyone else saw what he did, and was blown away by how many people across the state and beyond had similar experiences. He created a private Facebook group, asking others to share their videos and stories.

The group initially had between 30 and 40 members, Nowak said. But now, with people wanting to see the videos for themselves, the group has quickly grown to over 580.

“We just want to know what we and other saw,” Nowak said. “To me, it’s just incredibly perplexing.”

Mick West, a columnist who investigates conspiracy theories, tweeted that a Belgium family’s locally famous Christmas light display was “responsible for several ‘UFO’ sightings in Wisconsin.”

“From a distance all you see are the spots of lights moving in the clouds,” the tweet said. “Their motion follows music (broadcast on radio) in quite long and complex sequences.”

According to the attraction’s website, the light show runs from 5 to 10:30 p.m. Kimberly said her encounter took place after 10:45 p.m.

“From where I was and what we saw, there’s just no possible way that that would be it,” Kimberly said. “Between the distance and that there was nothing coming from the ground. It was over our vehicle, shining down in front of our headlights and things, it was definitely coming from the sky down.”

She said she drove to the light show to watch it herself, and then backtracked to West Bend. “It is not the same thing,” she said.

“We want to know what it is,” Kimberly said. “It would be great if we could ever find out for sure. And maybe someday we will.”

UFO investigators are now looking into the lights

Brittany Barbieri, ufologist and paranormal investigator, and Ben Hansen, UFO investigator and TV host, are leading an investigation into what these lights could be, calling it “Firefly UAP Event.” UAP stands for unidentified aerial phenomenon.

Barbieri said the two currently work together as production partners, investigating UFO/UAP reports with Hypocenter Productions.

For the Wisconsin case, the investigators have received over a dozen reports, most from the beginning of the month, including ones in Fredonia, Howard, the Green Bay area, and also Brighton, Michigan, Barbieri said.

“It’s really important that we look at everything, and look at all the plausible and possible explanations before pointing to a UFO directly,” Barbieri said. “We are not saying this is an alien invasion or any UFOs at all. We’re just trying to find the culprit that’s producing these lights.”

Barbieri and Hansen are currently trying to determine a source of light that could project the type of light seen in the videos and could also span the distances it was seen at. Nothing is being ruled out at this point, Barbieri said.

The lights project much like a sky tracker aerial searchlight would, Barbieri said, except for a couple of “weird tweaks.” They’ve presented these to manufacturing companies that work with sky trackers and LED lights, she said.

Barbieri said they’ve also been working with witnesses, and reaching out to local town halls, police departments, fire departments and the West Bend Airport for information.

“You have to investigate it almost like a crime scene,” Barbieri said. “You have to really look at every piece of the puzzle before giving an objection of your opinion.”

A Hypocenter Productions’ YouTube video of Hansen and Barbieri digging deeper into the accounts has been viewed more than 51,000 times since Monday.

“The biggest thing is sticking together, being there for each other and trying to help find the source,” Barbieri said. “At the end of the day, if we never find a source, it was just about the community and coming together to help each other. I think that’s what it’s all about.”

A weather or astronomical event? Weather service doesn’t have leads

The Journal Sentinel also checked in with the National Weather Service.

Beyond lightning, there are no other weather explanations for lights in the sky, said Marcia Cronce, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Sullivan. But lightning wasn’t present around the area on the first two nights of December.

“There was just a trace of precipitation, and I don’t have any thunderstorms in the area,” Cronce said. “So, I really can’t tell you exactly what that could have been.”