[ceejayoz]

> Planes have blinking lights, right?

Not necessarily - they can be turned off, non-functional, or drowned out by a brighter light like the landing lights from a distance.

> One of them disappeared in a flash...

Or someone flipped the landing lights switch.

I saw a C-17 at night while staying near Fort Drum that I was completely baffled by until it got close enough to properly make out. Had it stayed away, I'd have had one of those "inexplicable" encounters people talk about too.

[rblion]

There were two of them next to each other. Is that common at all?

Does 'formation flying' involve craft flying around in random non-linear fashion?

There was a bunch of us and we discussed it for awhile, aircraft is the first thing we jumped to...

[ceejayoz]

> There were two of them next to each other. Is that common at all?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formation_flying

That you're asking that question really makes it hard to credit the claim that you successfully ruled out "all the logical possibilities".

edit: You edited in some additional, so:

> Does 'formation flying' involve craft flying around in random non-linear fashion?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogfight

A distantly seen dogfight at night would involve afterburners (bright lights! and they'd wink on/off during maneuvering, when they're turned on/off, or when the plane turns to face towards you instead of away from you) and rapid random non-linear movements as described.

[ozzmotik]

my only question is, how likely is it that anyone is going to actually be witness to a dogfight at any given time? seems like something that would be pretty rare.

[ceejayoz]

Depends where you're located. I don't have an aviation map handy, but Beale AFB is less than 200 miles south of Mt. Shasta, and the Air Force trains continually.

[TeMPOraL]

There were two of them next to each other. Is that common at all?

How close is "next to"? Aircraft tend to have multiple lights, many symmetrically positioned. And when it's closer than you think and maneuvering, it may look as if the lights are moving non-linearly. Disappearance of a light can be explained too - the plane maneuvered in a way that its wing or fuselage blocked your view of the light.