Starlink satellites spotted in Cleveland area

CLEVELAND (WJW) – Dozens of viewers from across the Cleveland area reported seeing a string of bright lights in the sky Thursday night. So, what was it?

Astronomer Jay Reynolds confirmed with FOX 8 that the lights are actually Starlink, which is a satellite internet constellation operated by SpaceX.

According to a tracker on findstarlink.com, Starlink-G4-14 was bright in the sky from Rocky River for about five minutes around 9:50 p.m. if you were looking northwest to southwest.

On its website, Starlink says it, “provides high-speed, low-latency broadband internet across the globe.”

Fox 8 viewer Bobbi Hawk, of Ashland, said she and her fiance saw the “long string of individual lights, not a beam, in the night sky moving very slow.”

“There seemed to be a humming noise coming from the object,” she wrote. “Then it slowly faded away. There were no clouds in the sky to hide it, yet it disappeared. We both were staring at it until it disappeared after about 15-30 seconds…Different than an airplane. I did not catch the object fading away, as I was in awe of what was happening. Different than anything I have ever seen.”

According to reports from Forbes earlier this month, Starlink Internet is currently available in 29 countries. Eventually, SpaceX plans to have the constellation consist of thousands of small satellites low in Earth’s orbit.