May 6, 2026
Cloudy with a chance of chaos
B.C. residents baffled as shape floats through night sky
Turns out B.C.’s ‘mystery sky blob’ may have been a glowing cloud — and the comments were ruthless
TLDR: A strange white shape drifted over B.C. and beyond Tuesday night, leaving residents guessing whether it was a rocket effect, a balloon, or something weirder. In the comments, though, most people declared the mystery hilariously overblown and insisted it was basically just a glowing cloud.
For about 15 very dramatic minutes Tuesday night, people across northern and Interior British Columbia, plus parts of Alberta and Vancouver Island, looked up and saw a big white shape drifting across the sky — and the internet immediately did what it does best: spiral, squint, and roast. Some locals wondered if it was something wild, from a weather balloon to a visitor from another world. But in the comments, the vibe was far less X-Files and far more guys… it’s a cloud.
That’s where the real show started. One commenter mocked the very idea of a “shape,” joking that a triangle or square would be scarier, before landing the killer line: this all sounds like “they’re talking about a cloud.” Another piled on with a practical explanation: a high-up cloud can still catch sunlight after sunset, especially around a rocket launch, pointing to similar glowing sky scenes. A space expert quoted in the story said it didn’t look natural and that crowded skies now mean more strange sights, with more people filming them too — which only added fuel to the debate.
Still, the community wasn’t buying full-on mystery. One person dragged in the memory of the infamous “New Jersey drones” panic that turned out to be regular planes. And the funniest hot take of the night? “Great, now even our skies have floating garbage patches.” In other words: whether this was rocket exhaust, a glowing cloud, or just another case of collective sky confusion, the comments delivered the real spectacle.
Key Points
- •Witnesses across northern and Interior British Columbia, Vancouver Island, and parts of Alberta reported seeing a large white shape in the sky between about 10:15 and 10:30 p.m. PT Tuesday.
- •Videos and reports came from a wide area, including Williams Lake, Prince George, Fort St. John, Nass Valley, Kamloops, Oliver, Vancouver Island, and Sherwood Park, Alta.
- •The article says one recurring explanation was that the sighting may have been related to plumes from a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base earlier that evening.
- •Michael Unger of the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre said the object did not appear natural based on video, but he cautioned that any explanation would be speculative.
- •Unger said unusual sightings are becoming more common as skies become more crowded with drones, private satellites and rockets, while public video sharing also helps scientists track sky activity.