Bright Flashes in the Sky Saturday Night

So, I have finally had my first inexplicable observation of something that can only be described as a UFO. I have no idea what it was. Only that I have been watching the sky's for years and have never seen anything like this and am at a loss as to how to give it a conventional explanation. I am hoping that others here on the board may have seen the same thing and could collaborate what I witnessed.

I also highly suspect that the event may be one of many that have been occurring over our skies since at least last Saturday (6/9/2007).

My friends and I were camping in Jawbone Canyon,Mojave desert, nestled in the south-most portion of the Sierra's. I had brought my telescope (E.S. Astroscan, perfect for camping) and we had just finished up viewing Jupiter, Venus, Saturn and some deep sky objects when we noticed an extremely bright strobe-like flash shine for an instant on the horizon.

The first flash occured somewhere around 10:00PM and we witnessed at least two more within the next hour and a half. All coming from over the south to southwest horizon.

By 11:40 the night was beginning to truly blacken. As I was looking down towards the ground reaching for something or other, from my peripheral vision I saw what appeared to be a shooting star streak down, stop, and take off at a new angle as a red streak.

Because I was not looking directly at it I couldn't be sure. I shrugged it off and made a comment to my friends.

12:20 and the black of nigh is in full swing. Most of the glow from the Sun is long gone and the Moon won't be up for another four hours. The only competition the Milky Way has this evening is the glow from L.A. fifty miles to the southwest.

A flash of white, clear light blasts from a single source high, high, high in the northern sky. It is bright enough that anybody not facing south and looking directly at the ground would have seen it. It immediately drew the attention of all three of us.

By the time I had trained my gaze and focused on the object it was already dimming down to a halo of white light encompassing a ruby red point of light. Then from the center of this 'Mother' light, tiny specks of light began to emerge and emanate.

When they reached a circumference roughly equivalent to that of a silver dollar held at arms length, some of the 'baby' specks began to flash very brightly as well (though not red). I would say that each object only flashed once.

The 'baby' flecks then faded or moved out of sight and the 'mother' star seemed to stay in the sky but with a normal 'star like' appearance.

All three of us saw this and began discussing it as soon as it was over. The whole show could not have been longer than ten seconds. I asked my friend to dig out his digital camera in case it returned.

Using a Celestron SkyScout, I was able to determine that the star at the center of all the action was in fact Polaris.

So, today I have access to a computer again and I looked up anything that may have been similar to my experience on the MUFON website. There is an account that is VERY similar to my account (bright flash followed by specks of light) and occured in the same general area, though this particular witness claimed that the specks moved with volition.

What is interesting is that this person's sighting was on SUNDAY night. The night after my sighting.

So, given the flashes over the horizon we say, my first glimpse, our own eye witness, then another sighting that bears great similarity the next day...

Maybe this is a continuing phenomenon? I'm thinking about watching the skies again tonight. Because the objects appeared to be way outside the earth's atmosphere I'm betting people as fear east as Colorado may be able to see it.

As an eye-witness I can rule out Venus, asteroid, airplane, satellite and rocket. I'm open to any explanations.

If you are bored tonight it may be worth it to check the northern skies.