Light over Pocomoke City, MD

Pocomoke City, MD

5:37am to 5:39am March 1st, 2020: Returned from Berlin, Maryland, Walmart and was getting groceries out of truck when I looked up and thought Orion's belt looked strange - it was not Orion's belt but two lights in echelon formation going from southwest towards the northeast. I then realized it was a long line of lights, three or four single file and then two in echelon, three or four single file, then two in echelon - it kept repeating until 25 of the lights had passed overhead. No sound from jet engines and no blinking lights. All of the dots in the sky were a soft yellowish-white and all moved rapidly to the northeast. I started counting after a few had passed so it was probably more than 25. They came into view and then rapidly faded out of view as they proceeded northeast. I do not know if that was because their illumination was so soft, or if they literally had just appeared in the southwest sky, to disappear in the northeast sky. If they were jets they had to have been fighters. Regular commercial aircraft would not have been so close in echelon, and, in fact, one of the echelon formations shifted positions as they passed overhead. (It really struck me that someone had taken their eye off the ball and had allowed their craft to swing from left rear to even on the right with the leading light. It did not seem to be a smooth maneuver.) No idea as to altitude but the objects were the size of stars and that is why I thought it was something going on with Orion’s belt. While looking at the first two I briefly wondered if they were some sort of satellite but it rapidly became obvious that the objects were not in outer space but in the atmosphere. There was a clear sky, temperatures in the upper 20’s, no moon, stars could be clearly seen. No wind. I estimate the time of sighting lasted two minutes, when I went in the house after the last one flew over it was 5:39. My location is on the east coast flyway so I see a lot of aircraft overhead both day and night. Sometimes the commercial aircraft can be heard even when very high up, other times no sound is heard. This is a rural area; the night sky is very vivid. I often look up to see the stars or watch an aircraft in the night sky. The objects I saw do not fit anything I have seen before, there were no navigation lights. Also, while we have military aircraft go over now and then, I have never seen a long line formation such as I witnessed tonight. And Orion was not in the sky at that point, I had made a mistake when looking up as the objects at first looked like Orion’s belt and with the one’s in echelon I thought for a second I was seeing two belts. I was completely sober and not on any medical drugs when the sighting occurred. I was out at such an unusual hour as I had not been able to sleep so went to complete grocery shopping at the 24-hour Walmart up the road. (I do not like to waste time in bed staring at the ceiling so get up and do something to be active.) Report completed 6:24am March 1st, 2020