On Monday the 23rd we were driving through Idaho on ID33. As we were approaching the road that leads to the Teton Dam site we saw a series of blue explosions and flashes coming from a field about half a mile off the road. The first thing I thought was lightning, but not in the middle of winter, and the flashes were coming from the ground. The next thing I thought of was when the transformer station in Rigby, ID blew up a few years back, and this looked similar.
The blue flashes were throwing sparks in the air and lighting the whole valley. After half a dozen or so flashes it settled into a constant yellow light, like an electric arc burning something. That continued until we passed and it went back to bright blue flashes. We called 911 to report it and they said they already had people on the way out there.
Silhouetted in the light we could see a pivot and a building near the light. The light was bright enough that it was hard to see any details around it though. We passed several police vehicles and a fire truck on the way to Rexburg. Two hours later in Rexburg, ID, we could still see the flashes in the sky.
We're suspecting it had something to do with a down power line. I wondered if the line fell on a center pivot and was burning up the pivot. Either way we haven't found any news on it so I wanted to make sure this story was online somewhere, as I'm curious what would make such bright flashes of light.
EDIT:
On our way back home from the trip we drove out there to look at it and found that indeed a power pole had fallen on a center pivot. Not sure how it happened, as there was no wind and no fresh snow, but we got these pictures:
The first one shows the remains of the pole on the ground by the pivot on the west side of the road. The second one shows where the pole came from.
