I found the traffic cam’s location here. (Choose the I-17 Radio Button and then S of Northern on the "Select-a-location drop down menu.)
Here is the Lat. Long. ( 33.545794,-112.112303 ) Paste in a google maps query and it should bring you there.
I also used an address: 7500 N Black canyon Phoenix AR and various street view tools to get a feel for the area.
Assuming the camera is faces N-NNW and that the flash is off to left by a few more degrees and extending a line on a map, it looks to me like the flash was in the neighborhood of ASU/west campus. ( 33.545794,-112.112303 )
I’m guessing the high energy laser prank at the pool party went awry when that crusty old dean caught his secretary, D-D Kupps, and Düüfhoser in flagrante delicto in the cabana by turning on all the lights in the complex.
If you watch the video, it’s NOT a weather ballon. It’s a quick flash.
If it was a UFO it was in the process of becoming a UCO.
It really looks like it’s coming from the ground and it’s a quick burst.
I think by looking at the camera’s location you can tell that the flash comes from the NNW. Looking on the map there’s a mall and ASU. I think the Mall is almost straight N of the camera and it looks to me like that camera isn’t facing N, but rather it’s trained on the road itself and so it’s pointing N-NNW.
Given that, I think the flash came from the direction of campus.
With the video quality and the time of day, it wouldn’t have had to be a bright flash. And something unreported on a campus makes more sense than something unreported with the utilities.
I’m guessing a transformer blew up (the kind used on utility poles, not the Optimus Prime kind). When I was a kid there was a big ice storm that pulled down a bunch of the power lines, and I remember sitting on the porch with my dad and watching a bunch of similar flashes in the sky for the same reason.
That assumes that the laser is pointed toward the camera. If what we are seeing is the result of the laser beam being refracted by, say, the floor of an indoor pool along with its chemical water content… and an unattended double D cup bikini top?
I would not be surprised if they have large transformers that could short out and create a flash like that, and it wouldn’t necessarily be reported to any local authority outside the University.