Anyone Star-Gazing Last Night? Strange Light.

[username]

Was anyone star gazing last night?  I saw a strange light and was wondering if anyone could identify it.

 

About 20:55 I was looking at the summer triangle.  Deneb and Vega were visible and I thought I was observing Altair, until the light "turned off" so to speak.  Once that light went off, I found Altair in the sky.

 

Over the next few minutes, the light, which I then thought was a satellite, appeared to turn on and off.  It's luminosity varied.  Occasionally, being one of the brightest "stars" in the sky.

 

On rare occasions, I have seen satellites that became very bright for a second and then dimmed.  My hypothesis is that we usually see satellites due to reflection off of their main body, however, on rare occasions you are in just the right place for more light reflected from other parts, such as solar panels.  However, if this were the case, I would expect to have seen the brightness increase once, and not several times over the course of a few minutes.

 

The light did not appear to track as a satellite should, however, I did not track the light for long.

 

The light was in the Eastern sky.  

 

I wonder if there were any rocket launches from Florida yesterday?  I know they travel from Florida towards Africa over the ocean, but not sure if that would be East enough to have been where I observed.

 

Any ideas?

Edited August 21, 2017 by username

[GhostBear]

(Cue twighlight zone music)

[Zipper]

Star Gazing last night? I didn't look up until after my neighbor put her top back on. I must have missed it.

[Greybeard]

One night, 40+years ago, I was star gazing with a bunch of friends while on a campout.  Nice clear night up past Monticello NY.  Just so happened the star I was looking at was moving, getting smaller as it only moved to the right by an inch across the sky.  After a few minutes it got so small I could no longer follow it.  "Somebody pass me another beer, I think I just saw a UFO heading out of dodge."