What was it? Beam of light between a star and an airplane.?

Question

Friday night (March 30th, 2007) at around 11:00pm I saw an aircraft in the distance with what looked like a search light on it (like searchlights on helicopters). I noticed that it was an airplane, but the light was focused on one spot while the plane kept flying across the sky. That one spot happened to be on the brightest star in the sky that night that I could see (in the Los Angeles area, no less). The star was about 30 degrees up in the sky at that time. It appeared to be South-West of where I was.
Are there planes that for some reason shine a light on a star?? (That would seem counterintuitive to me.) Or could it have been some kind of reflection or shadow or something? I watched the plane for at least 4 minutes as it passed overhead and out of view, the whole time I could see the light accross the sky.
Any ideas? I searched all kind of astronomy websites and couldn't find anything.

Answer 1

Planes often have a light shining forward on take off and landing. The plane was flying in a straight line. It is coincidence it was pointing at that star.

Answer 2

You have no way of visually estimating the direction of that beam from your perspective. From the pilot's perspective the beam would have been at a completely different part of the sky.

When looking at objects in a 3-D perspective, you have to think 3-D. I think you have a 2-D conceptualisation. Most people can't get past that, so don't worry about it. However, it will affect your judgement when viewing things beyond your 3-D vision, which for anyone is only measured in a metres.

I know people who have seen a large meteor look as though it has come down to earth, and expect to find it in the next field, when it was probably 60 kilometres away.

Answer 3

It was probably the landing lights lighting up the smog.