Absolutely eyewitnesses are not all that dependable.
200 of them all saying the same thing would get my attention.
Trained military people with experience who say its a missile make me a believer.
Couple it with a simple fact. If they admitted it was a missile, that’s hundreds of billions in economic damage. It is a disruption of status quo foreign policy. It’s a demand for military action that some may not wish to take.
If they say it’s a spark, all that goes away. In it’s place is only ‘conspiracy theories’ which are easily explained away as swamp gas, the location of Venus and flocks of geese.
And a whole bunch of people going along because they don’t want to be blackballed as nuts...I wonder which is easiest to go with.