Fireball over Moncks Corner, SC

The report, as filed

My husband, my children (7 and 5), my father in law and myself were heading out from the grands house around 10:00 PM Christmas night. My father in law was sitting in the drive, waiting for us to come out to take us home when he noticed what he at first glance thought was a plane with an engine on fire. Mind you my father-in-law worked in law enforcement for 25+ years here in our town. He has actually witnessed a small plane go down. Upon looking he noticed that there were two more just like it trailing the first in almost an uneven triangular shape with a fourth trailing even further behind on the right. There was also no sound at all. He had no explanation for what he was seeing. At this time my family and myself were walking out to greet him and pile in the car to go when he started to tell us what he had seen. We then looked up (naturally) to see exactly what he was talking about and sure enough we caught the fifth and last fireball looking orb. It had momentum and seemed to be moving in a direction. They all went in the same direction. The one my husband and my kids witnessed as well as myself was completely silent. There were planes all in the sky and you could clearly identify them just by looking and listening, but this orb like ball was different. If you stared at it, it looked as if the entire thing was on fire and it kind of bobbed as it was moving forward. It never lost or gained altitude. It just traveled across the sky until completely out of sight. My kids were excited and wanted to know what we had just seen.. All I could tell them was that (because of their ages) it was Santa and Rudolph going back home to the North Pole after visiting the children in the US. My husband and I were baffled and dumbfounded, but I found the whole experience exciting, especially because my odds of ever witnessing that again are slim to none.

Held as-reported from National UFO Reporting Center (record NUFORC #125144). Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.