Marfa Lights Explained

billsoxs writes "The Marfa lights are ghostly lights that have been observed for years around Marfa TX (near Big Bend). They have been the subject of curiosity , a source of tourism and scientifically studied a number of times. Now a group of physics students from the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) have use small lasers and traffic sensors to show that these lights are most likely headlights from cars on a distant highway. The publication is in the Society of Physics Students website. The PDF of the article is here. (Unfortunately the related video is no longer available on the web but more stuff is here.)"

Weird...

[MSFanBoi2]

I didn't know there were major highways with automobiles running around on them back when the lights first were seen...

This has been an urban legend here in Texas...

[Tuxedo Jack]

For a while now, and I'm rather glad it's been explained.

Now if they'd move on to the Blue Light Cemetery, I'd be more interested.

http://www.cemeteries-of-tx.com/Etx/Harris/cemeter y/bluelight.htm [cemeteries-of-tx.com]

Re:This has been an urban legend here in Texas...

[Tuxedo Jack]

For those of you who don't want to Google, let me explain. (Those of you who know Houston and its legends, you can skip this.)

In Houston, there's a reservoir out on the west side. Back during the 1800s, this was a floodplain, and the settlers lived there. They had a cemetery in what is now Bear Creek Park, and over the years, the cemetery became lost to the trees and such. Nowadays, teenagers use it for god-knows-what, despite the park rangers and Harris County sheriff's office sending deputies over the whole park area.

Legend says that there are blue lights there at night. It's commonly explained away as light glinting off the tombstones, but I've been there, and I can't say that the tombstones are what's giving off the light, seeing as how it was well away from the tombstones when I saw it.

Interesting, but ruining a source of revenue...

[redwoodtree]

So, it's like an episode of Scooby-Doo basically, everyone knows the lights are cars but the local area has used it as sort of fun way of attracting tourists and they even have a festival around the event. See http://www.qsl.net/w5www/marfa.html [qsl.net] . So, it's kind of sad that these students went to this amount of trouble to explain away the lights.

I think it's interesting that the local legend has it that the lights have been there before cars and that you hear a tuning fork sound in one ear. Obviously these little details have been added to add the little bit of doubt to keep the charade going and to draw some more money into town.

It's a fun thing... let it go, as I'm sure the people down there will not be accepting of even a scientific study like this.

Re:Weird...

[randyzoch]

Good detective work. This story dates back to the 1880's. Try using Google sometime.
http://www.qsl.net/w5www/marfa.html [qsl.net]
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/article s/MM/lxm1.html [utexas.edu]

Re:Weird...

[Anonymous Coward]

I have seen them, and they are not headlights from cars. That is pretty obvious. You are most likely to see them in times of high humidity, and very late at night. There is only the one highway with an observation spot, and not very many cars (this is an extremely rural area). At one time a Japanese film crew chased them with helicopters and jeeps, and they never got close to catching them, although they were able to film them. Disclaimer, I did not read the article, but if you had ever seen them, you would know better.

It took how much work to show this is the source?

[Anonymous Coward]

What I saw at Marfa, which everyone there explained to be the Marfa lights, where easily recognized as lights from traffic. I know the arguement is that there where lights before the highway was there, however, that doesen't mean the lights they see now are the same as what was seen then. I took long exposure shots of the current lights and they followed an easily tracable path, which conincides with the highway. The distortion/shimmer is easily explained with the point of view, distance and heat rising off the earth at night. Not much else to say, imo. I certainly won't rule out that there are other more interesting lights, but I was utterly unimpressed with what I've seen. I do like Marfa though, and it's still fun. Any excuse to be out in the pitch black desert at night is good enough for me.

Those damn SUVs...

[Chaffar]

According to the article:

All of the mystery lights observed by this group on the nights of 11 and 13 May 2005 can be reliably attributed to automobile headlights travelling along US 67 between Marfa and Presidio, TX.

According to the Lee Paul [theoutlaws.com] though, The first recorded Texan history occurred in 1883.

Yep, in 1883 it was all the craze to install those Bi-Xenon headlights on your SUV...

I know these guys

[Anonymous Coward]

My ex-roommate was one of the physics students who went on the trip. They went in the summer of 2004, and it was basicaly an excuse to get funding so they could go on a road trip/camping. From what I hear they also brought along plenty of booze and weren't exactly in a 'scientific' mindset most of the trip. They had fun though, and got a free trip out of it, so more power to them.

Re:Finally!

[mark-t]

Science only answers the "how".

Religion has to answer the "why".

If one subscribes to the premise that religions are superstition, then there is no "why" at all.

In fact, to even begin to ask why, you have to suppose that there was some purpose for it in the first place, which automatically implies the existence of an intelligence or reasoning entity that designed the purpose.

We have a similar cemetary near me.

[hullabalucination]

We have a local legend about a "ghost lights cemetary" just south of Springtown, Texas. I've taken a look and it is indeed caused by small particles in the tombstone material that is more reflective than the rest of the stone. It reflects the pale glow on the horizon of the nearby town's lights at night. Quite eerie the first time you see it and locals insist that supernatural things happen there but the phenomenon is easily explanable. Tombstones further away give the most interesting effect as the light seems to eminate away from any observable objects, as if floating in mid-air.

Dry line anyone?

[Stupor Man]

Actually, no idea what causes the light. Since reports date automobiles and electricity to the region..... Have any of these students given thought to the Marfa Dry line? It's a pretty well known fact in the weather world. Doesn't explain the lights, but I find it odd that people often say things like "humidity", "moisture", etc. when explaining these lights and never does one of them mention of the Marfa Dry line. Hmmm. Could it be there is a link? LOL

Australia's Min Min lights - also hot air involved

[dbIII]

These sound like Australia's Min Min lights seen in a fairly dry region which were explained a couple of years ago. Early sightings are thought to have been kerosene lamps - and then in the early days of the automobile people still drove in that area before there were roads. Layers of still desert air in flat country can do odder things than the usual false water mirage.

Really weird optical effects happen in cold air areas too - like the false suns seen in Antarctica at times.

Next one - crop circles. Drunken Australian tourists with sticks and rope in at least a few of the early cases.

Re:Finally!

[dbIII]

Sadly, it seems like most people are completely uninterested in scientific explainations for anything

Take for example the sighting of a cigar shaped green light over London in the late 1800's. Some insensitive clod put the light through a spectrograph and made detailed observations, thus finding out more about the northern lights and putting off the UFO craze for over half a century when people who jumped to rapid conclusions were listened to instead.

As it is, we are pretty low in supply of "scientists" and time to devote to relatively unimportant things like studying swamp light

Why not - if it's cool, interesting and weans people off the magnetic blankets and other superstition? A study of belly button fluff (ignoble last year I believe) got people involved with a radio science talkback program.

ID is just a symptom of general ignorance and superstition which is becoming common. On Friday a geophysics student about to start an honors year helping out in her holidays was telling me that CRT computer screens give you the same amount of radiation as a medical X-ray after a week of exposure - of some sort of radiation like X-rays only different and just as damaging - told to her by a doctor apparantly. My explanation of how a CRT works and how an X-ray tube works only got as far as mentioning amounts of energy involved, intensity and target materials before I could tell she thought I was lying to her because I have an agenda to not replace CRTs with LCDs due to cost. Even many of those in science studies have fallen victim to snake oil sociopaths and see technical folk as Moorlocks who will eat their babies to keep technology going.

Back to pseudo-science on TV - one thing that pissed me off intensely was the "roads that go into the sea" crap about Easter Island on one TV program made decades after they were shown to be boat ramps by scuba divers.

Re:Those damn SUVs...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah its definitely not car lights. I grew up 26 miles from there (Alpine, Tx) and have seen them hundreds of times and I can say for a matter of fact that its not highway lights.

Re:Not Very Comprehensive; Duplicate Study

[Anonymous Coward]

However, their study does not resolve or even address one problem with this conclusion - the lights have been visible long before cars were common, or even available, in the area.

The lights have allegedly been visible. I think you'll find it quite difficult to find any reliable documentary evidence that anyone claimed to have seen the lights at any time before cars became common in the area. Basically it appears that there are no claims of sightings before the 1950s that were actually recorded at the time; all references to sightings before the 1950s were, in fact, written down after the 1950s, and the "evidence" on which they're based is either local Indians saying "oh, yes, we totally do have a legend about those lights, and it's really ancient, of course we didn't just make it up", or local old folk saying "oh, yes, I totally did see those lights in 1890, of course I'm not just telling you what you want to hear in the hopes that you'll buy me another drink, no sir".

Count me totally unconvinced.