Tell me these aren't cars.

The youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrnZVTzQ06Y

The light appears.  Then gets really bright.  Highbeams anyone?  Then it gets dimmer and then you see a second somewhat redder light.  Tailights of a car going in the opposite direction anyone?  Light got dimmer because either the slope of the road changes so that the light isn't aimed directly at the viewing spot or because the driver dimmed highbeams because of oncoming traffic.  Then another light appears…another car cresting the hill and coming toward the viewing spot.

Here's a still.

Here's a 2x enlargement.  The red light is made of two separate smaller lights…taillights.  The brighter lower light is also made of two smaller lights, headlights.  The bright area infront of it is the reflection of the lights on the road.

Obviously I'm missing something.

Revenant said:

Let's talk about their headlight test. They took the closest spot that they could on a nearby road and couldn't emulate the light, although…the light was still seen. A few things wrong with this "experiment (and am I the only who gets queasy when they mention the word "experiment?")." First up, not all headlights are created equal, as in the height from the ground to the headlights themselves. A compact car will be different from a large sedan to a SUV to a pick-up truck and lastly to a semi-truck. To do testing on a single vehicle is not the end all and be all of testing for headlights.

Yep, not all headlights are equal and not all stretches of road are visible. They should have put those patrol cars to real use and conducted a decent "experiment" Have them drive up to Bruce's Crossing. Put their flashing-lights on, and have two of them drive down Highway 45 to where old highway 45 crosses the new highway again south of their viewing location. Not just one little section of highway.

Yeah, everyone knows that what they should have done was to dust the FRONT of the car if they suspected the children were pulling it!

And come on, the car is parked 100 some feet from the tracks…how stupid are these kids if they think the car is in danger there if its not moving.  So what do they do, they push the car into the potential path of the train.  Someone flunked Rocket Science 101.

Dr. Herbert West said:

I'm positive any one of us on SV would have done a thousand times better job than they did.  I think some money changed hands to keep the mystery going.

Okay.  I have vented my speen.  Thanks.

Vent noted :) (We're all doing a bit of that lately at this show!) So far SV HAS done about a thousand times better than they have, and none of us have had to go anywhere to do it, either. I think you're right about the "keep the mystery going" thing, especially in this economy when there is a gift shop involved.

http://www.michigansotherside.com/Articles/The_Paulding_Light.htm

Just as an example. This fellow says the light comes and goes all night. The FS sign says that it appears each evening…but does not specify ONLY in the evening.

Ghaleon said:

If you don't want to do the 2 person test then all you really need is just a telescope, thats how most have found out the truth about this light.

Or to save a lot of travel money and time (and the cost of a telescope if you don't own one), just zoom in on the video and you'll see the individual headlights/taillights resolve as I did above. Would have been very evident in the video FoF had that got them excited in the first place. But, then, if they examined videos closely before jumping on them, we wouldn't get to see Austin's four-wheeler-foray as he tries to morph into a spider lol