In advance of the landings

It has been a busy week for strange things in in the sky. We get a few unresolvable queries every year but so many in a short period must mean something. It could be we're about to be invaded, an odd statistical quirk or perhaps the good weather means more people are outdoors and are looking at the sky. Here are the details followed by my comments.

• Friday 18 June: a lady in Belfast observed over several minutes a slowly moving orange light which left a smoke trail and appeared to have bits dropping off it. It was recorded on video (see still above).
• Saturday 19 June: a gentleman in Bangor observed a slowly drifting fireball leaving a smoke trail. It eventually vanished. The witness rang friends a few miles away who had seen it too.
  
• Saturday 19 June: a family watching a sunset from the north coast observed a flaming comet-like object which hung in the sky for 15 minutes or more and gradually dispersed.
• Monday 21 June: an observer in Cookstown observed a relatively bright but slowly moving light which abruptly "exploded", becoming extremely bright, then faded away.
• Tuesday 22 June: an observer in Maghera reported a fireball like a burning aircraft which appeared to fall in a nearby field.

So what have these people seen? I was not there so I cannot say. The first two sound like the 'Chinese lanterns' so common today. I have never seen one myself but these really do seem meet the description. The 'flaming comet' is a mystery; my best guess is it was a high-altitude cloud or contrail illuminated by the reddish rays of the setting Sun. I'm fairly certain the exploding light was the flare of an Iridium satellite, a magnitude -6 one was visible from the witness's location during the time he was observing. The final one may have been a bright meteor or bolide. I hoping some else may have seen it. (Update: sadly, as of 1 July no one else has came forward to confirm this sighting.)

Alas, I am very certain none of these represent sightings of alien spacecraft. Unidentified flying objects and spaceships are not necessarily the same thing.