IBERIA PARISH — Around 10 p.m. Saturday night, many residents in Acadiana witnessed a mysterious object soaring through the sky. What exactly was it?
Nancy Lacy, a resident of New Iberia, was one of the fortunate few who managed to capture the spectacle on camera.
"No, I've never seen anything like that in my life," Lacy said.
Lacy and her family were out looking at Christmas lights in their neighborhood when they spotted the strange light show thousands of feet above them.
“At first, it’s really scary, it’s something that you really haven’t seen before,” Lacy said. "Maybe it's Santa doing some early Christmas deliveries," she joked.
Lacy also wondered if the event might be a "strike of luck."
"Well, I guess it’s like a shooting star, so maybe we need to make a wish," she said.
But if you made a wish, it likely won’t come true.
KATC’s chief meteorologist, Rob Perillo, explained the phenomenon.
“What we saw last night was actually a Chinese satellite burning up in the Earth's atmosphere," Perillo said. "The friction created by the satellite entering the atmosphere gets hot enough to burn metal, and that's what we saw."
Perillo also noted the satellite was visible far beyond Acadiana, from Missouri and Indiana all the way to South Texas and Florida.
"This is definitely a Christmas light show that we will remember forever," lacy said.
