Sup, first post... was looking around for somewhere to discuss Brisbane UFOs. This seems like a spacey Australia oriented forum no? Not nessesarily alien-UFO, i mean just UNIDENTIFIED, coz i don't know what this was that i saw and i'd like to know!


ok, here's the copypasta i already posted elsewhere:

Today (Friday 6 April 2007) at around 6:45pm in the car on the way home from Brisbane City, traveling north around Boondall my family and i spotted something odd in the sky.

The sun had gone just below the horizon, so the clouds were dark with shadow but the sky was still relatively bright. In the sky out to the East was a thin white plume, quite bright as if it was cloud reflecting sunlight. It looked a lot like a comet, but i figured it was just the beginnings of a high altitude plane contrail - i figured it was higher than the clouds so it'd still be picking up the sunlight - thus why it was so bright compared to the darker clouds around.

As a few minutes went past, it struck me as strange that the contrail behind this thing wasn't getting any longer. Also the whole thing seemed to be getting BIGGER, BRIGHTER and more spectacular.

Everyone in the car (3 of us) were perplexed at what this could possibly be. I noticed a momentary sunlight reflection off the fusalage of whatever this craft was - it became apparent that it was approaching fast. We pulled over the car to get a better look at this.

The plume behind this thing was not a contrail at all, it was FIRE. We paniced momentarily as we thought maybe it was an plane on fire in the sky, but there was no smoke trail or anything, just a plume of fire behind it.

Someone suggested it was a rocket, comming in from space. And honestly i wonder. Because i know of NOTHING that can burn fuel for so long.

This thing was flying seemingly horizontal, higher than clouds (it momentarily disappeared behind clouds), had a plume of fire behind it that stretched for what i'd say was 5-15x the length of the craft itself. What else produces such a long plume? No aircraft i've ever heard of. Afterburner flames arn't so long are they?

Let me set this straight, this was not a dump-&-burn. The huge plume behind this craft lasted for as long as we watched it, and we watched it fly overhead for 10 minutes! They do dump-&-burns over the riverfire festival and they last mere seconds.

As the craft & plume got closer the plume could be seen well, it was shimmering like fire - like rocket fuel. You could see patterns traveling down the plume, like small gaps - natural fluctuations in the fuel supply or who knows.

It eventually disappeared behind a large stormcloud to the south, and we all got in the car and continued home hoping that we might be able to see it come outof the other side of the cloud - but it was a big cloud and i'm sure it was too far away by the time it emerged.

The whole time it traveled in a straight line, going south-west. Pretty much a straight line towards the nearby Brisbane airport, but it was WAY too high to be landing there. It would have flown straight over it.

What do you think this was?

i really am at a loss as to what it was, a scramjet test-vehicle or something?!

It looked like a rocket. There is nothing else i can think of that can produce such a large plume for so long a time. I don't know who to tell or ask about this, Australian Airservices? i really want to know what it was. And i'm concerned that something so strange/cool could be flying around without me knowing about it. I mean, there are no Spaceports near Brisbane haha... uh, that i know.

What do you think this was?
i wish i had cameraphone eh.

Did anyone else in Brisbane see it?