Sorry, it’s not ‘the Canadians’ this time

– Photo of the lights above East Lake on Wednesday night by Blake Vader. By eye, they were bright yellow-white lights that remained illuminated for four or five minutes as they floated slowly downward.

It seems people on both sides of Lake Ontario get excited when mysterious lights appear in the sky. It’s most often flares from military training. This time, apparently, it’s not.

Sharing photographs of lights that appeared in the County sky Tuesday night, local residents chimed in:

“Was weird… no clue what it is. Hope it is military, wish I knew what for sure,” said one Prince Edward County Facebook post comment Tuesday night.

“Looks like flares, but I secretly hope it’s aliens,” said another post comment.

Internet links to stories from the United States also discussed the mysterious appearance of lights over Lake Ontario.

A WHAM 13 ABC story Tuesday from Rochester, New York indicated basic flares were ruled out by the US Coast Guard, but they were reaching out to the Canadian Forces to see if exercises were being carried out. News 8 WROC Rochester shared a video of the mysterious string of yellow white lights that remained illuminated for four or five minutes as they floated slowly downward.

Indeed, the Canadians were at work – Monday and Tuesday nights – as the 8 Wing CFB Trenton 424 Transport and Rescue Squadron conducted flare training south of Brighton, and west of Prince Edward County.

But Captain Julie Brunet, 8 Wing Senior Public Affairs Officer confirmed with Countylive that training did not commence until after 21:30, and as such, the lights observed and captured in photographs earlier “are not from 8 Wing, Trenton”.

Upon reports in the US media Wednesday that the flares were from training, Brunet again confirmed to us the 424 squadron trained from 21:30 until shortly after midnight and noted the squadron only conducts this type of training after sundown.

The Canadian Coast Guard has also confirmed there were no exercises involving flares from CCG ships at the time.

CC-130H Hercules aircraft launch yellow-white flares from an altitude no lower than 5,500 feet above sea level. The training supports night time Search and Rescue missions and allows the squadron to practice night time flying and spotting procedures.

“These Canadian flares that they drop – these aren’t like little firecracker flares. These are industrial-military flares. You can see them from miles and miles away. They’re reported as UFOs, they’re reported as ships on fire,” said Steve Orr, in 2014, writing for the Democrat & Chronicle, part of the USA Today Network. “Whenever someone reports unusual lights over Lake Ontario – and that happens more often than you might think – the flare explanation is usually the first one offered. ‘It’s the Canadians,’ people say.”

Sorry, apparently it’s not the Canadians, this time!