MNNightwing

NOTE: I forgot to mention how bright the flash is. It was about as bright as Vega or Arcturus in the night sky, as a comparison. MUCH brighter than most transponder lights or strobes on private, commercial, or civil aircraft regardless of how close those aircraft might be...much brighter.

I apologize if this is the incorrect place to post this query, but I am new to the lounge and very curious as to what I have been seeing. From my perspective on my back deck: 46.8634745, -95.9774050, I have watched/witnessed a very bright, long-delayed flashing light in the night sky on four separate occasions - 3 times traveling from SSE to the NNW in a nearly straight South to North line along the longitudinal, and once traveling NNW to SSE in a nearly straight North to South line (in other words not very east to west at all), usually to the east of my location and at a very high altitude and angle (nearly 90 degrees above...say about 85 degrees from the eastern horizon). The flash catches my eye, and I can count to about 30-one-thousand before it flashes again, so roughly thirty seconds between flashes. The flash is very bright and very long compared to any of the limited air traffic I generally see in this remote locale. (Most air traffic is small craft out of Detroit Lakes airport, 7 miles to the east, or Fargo International, about 60 miles to the WNW. ALL of which I am accustomed to seeing and readily identifying...even those few jet liners that have their landing lights on flying toward me from Fargo.) I have searched and researched online to find out what type of aircraft (or high atmosphere, lower outer space objects; i.e., satellites) might have a strobe that flashes so infrequently as thirty seconds between flashes, but have found no information whatsoever. The flash is approximately one-half-second long (if counting one-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, etc., it flashed for about "one-one" in the count). It appears to be white or possibly a light amber and resembles the reflection of the sun off of a satellite at dusk (which I have seen often in the western portion of the sky at dusk; i.e., tracing a dimly lit satellite travelling SSE to NNW not long after sunset when trying to see the first stars as they appear, and then, there is a bright flash as the satellite reflects the sun which set some 30 to 40 minutes prior, and then, going back to the dimly lit pin-prick of light that a satellite normally is until it fades from view to the NNW). However, even though I can "guess" or estimate where the flash will occur again in thirty seconds (roughly a straight line), I do not or cannot see the pin-prick dot of light that one normally sees when viewing a passing satellite in the interim between flashes. The most recent sighting occurred on about February 20 (sorry that I did not note the exact date), and I was out at about 3 a.m., watching "The Summer Triangle" rising in the northeastern sky. While surprised that Deneb, Vega, and a bit of Altair were already visible in February, the flash caught my eye not far from Vega...just NW or toward Polaris from Vega's position. It was very cold out (-25 to -30 F or so), and the night sky was very clear. I watched without blinking so that I could see if the next flash would occur along the path it had the past three times I had seen it; i.e., to the NNW of its last flash, but this time whatever the object was had traveled to the SSE. I was able to infer its trajectory and where it would next flash two more times along its trajectory before it was obscured by nearby trees and rooftops. I don't know if my description helps anyone to help me with an answer to the quandary, but if not, I will try to have more exact specifics the next time I see it. Oh! By the way, the four sightings have all been within the last year or 18 months out of the 40 to 45 years I have star gazed. I have not seen this peculiar flashing light before 2019. Thanks in advance for any possible sources for this phenomenon.