The Stars Were Aligned
When I was a kid, I was out in the mountains near Mammoth, California, stargazing with my dad and a few family friends. I was from Los Angeles, so it was the first time I’d ever seen the stars without any light pollution, and I was fascinated.
I pointed at a cluster of three stars and said, “Hey look! It’s Orion’s Belt!” Only being a kid, I got it wrong. My father corrected me and showed me where Orion’s Belt was actually located. So I pointed to the one from before and said, “Well, what constellation is that then?”
He conceded that it did look very similar to Orion’s Belt, but that he couldn’t tell what it actually was. A little while later, we noticed that what appeared to be the middle star of the three started moving—quickly.
It zig-zagged through the sky for a few seconds before its brightness intensified, and then it disappeared. To this day, the only thing I think it could possibly be was some kind of experimental drone.
And if it was a drone, it must’ve been a super-advanced one because a) this was the early 90s and b) it stood still for long enough for us to think it was a star. Story credit: Reddit / (jdrc07)