Mystery Lights Page 1

Rest assured that there is more to this mystery than mere car lights.  Instead of looking southwest (in the general direction of the red flashing tower and Chinati Mountain) try looking to the southeast (you will probably see a green mercury vapor ranch light in that direction), to the south (in the general direction of the little white pump house but beyond it) and west (just a little left of Marfa).  Ranch trucks can also be seen to the south and southeast but vehicles in Mitchell Flat are close enough to detect taillights and headlight beams if you are paying close attention.  Binoculars are not essential but certainly help when it comes to sorting out vehicle lights from mystery lights.  You need to have a certain amount of luck or else patience because Marfa's Mystery Lights appear only a few times a year.  But if it is your lucky night you may be treated to some very unusual lights. 

Mystery Lights (MLs) typically pulse with varying levels of intensity going all the way from very bright to completely off and then back on again.  Colors are most often in the white to amber or orange range with occasional transition to brilliant red.  Bright red MLs are short lived.  They either transition back to very bright or else go out completely.

Mystery Lights fly above the desert with typical altitudes in the 10 to 400 feet range although one version (I call them Type IVs) do exist entirely above the horizon.  High flying Type IVs are more dynamic.

In addition to pulsing, MLs love to execute divides (some times many divisions will occur resulting in appearance of many MLs) and mergers (recombination of divided lights).  The off-spring will sometimes seem to orbit around the parent or else dance back and forth.  These antics are a pretty clear indications that you are seeing actual MLs.  

MLs may stay in one spot and pulse on and off with varying levels of intensity or they may move across the desert floor usually to the Northwest but they might go in any direction and reversals are common.  ML events can last anywhere from milliseconds to more than an hour (10.5 hours being the longest ever reported).  The mean duration is 4 minutes but "Good" ML events typically last around 15 to 20 minutes. 

Below are a few photographic examples of what you might see.  The "rainbow-like" patterns are mystery light spectra generated in some of my camera lenses and not something that you will actually see.  Also, these pictures are all time exposures so moving MLs create light tracks during the time my camera shutter is open.  If you were there to witness these events you would only see a light (or lights) moving low across the desert.   More examples are on the next page.

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About 1/3 of the time mystery lights (MLs) are stationary (I call these Type II).  When that happens time exposures show the disk instead of a light track.  The image on the left has a red surround that is real but the purple surround on the right is a by product of the lens used to make that photograph

This 6 second time exposure captured a period of expansion as the ML moved right to left.  Notice how the color becomes reddish as the light source expands suggesting that the expansion resulted in cooling (possibly an adiabatic process).  Interestingly, the color shifts back to white-yellow as the light source contracts back to a smaller size.  This ML continued moving to the left.

What is interesting in this photograph is the reddish excursion as if something is losing energy and descending toward the ground.

This image appears on the cover of my book.  It is a time exposure of a moving light source near Whirlwind Mesa.  Soon after this photograph was taken the light divided into multiple lights.   Some of the off-spring hung around to oscillate or orbit (shown directly below and on the next page) while others sped off to the northwest and traveled many miles before extinguishing. 

This time exposure followed not long after the photograph directly above it.  The bright center is the primary ML and the rest of the light track was created by one or more MLs orbiting this primary center or else they were oscillating back and forth.  There is no way to know which but I suspect light patterns such as these are created by off-spring MLs orbiting the primary.  Notice the two extensions that slope down toward the ground.  These extensions may have been created by MLs running out of energy and descending toward the ground before going out.

The 'Chevron' effect seen in this photograph was caused by wind disturbing my tripod mounted camera.  The white-yellow and red lights located higher up (they are estimated to be at about 400 feet) are light tracks of real MLs.  The greenish lower left light is a Mercury Vapor (MV) ranch light and it is stationary so the right to left spread reveals the total amount of wind induced camera oscillation.  The two red MLs are not spread so they occurred when the camera was not in motion.  The lower right green light is part of emission spectra from the MV light created in my camera lens. 

One type of ML exists entirely above the horizon.  I call these Type IVs and they are hard to photograph because they move very fast and are short lived.  This may be the only photograph ever taken of Type IVs.  There are two MLs smeared together in this time exposure.  In my haste to take this photograph I accidentally bumped the camera and created two slopping artifacts seen on the right.  This was a single bump and it shows that there were two lights involved.

An interesting ML photographed from the Marfa Lights View Park on July 23, 2007.  The ML was moving left to right not long after sunset.  This photograph was made using an infrared capable camera that nicely captures elements not visible to the naked eye.

 

I put this page together to show the wide range of possible ML configurations.  More ML images are presented on the next page.