Description of event: a bright orange fire like light defiantly ABOVE the water, but BELOW any flight path. Moving along the coastline but about a mile past the breakers, it was directly out to sea from us when we noticed it. we watched it move south, fade, grow bright and move North beyond us, it did not ascend or decend,but moved parallel to the coast. a pale orange beam shone from it faintly and passed over the beach.it would repeat this for several passes then it moved north and do the same thing after about an hour and a half, we watched it fade from view. We noticed it again about 15 minutes later down by Ocean Shores doing the same S to N, while shining its faint orange beam on the shore, fade grow bright. It continued to do this until we left the beach at about 3:45 AM I took picturesz with my cellphone. We noticed it at approximately 1 am, while we were taking down our tarp/ canopy beach shelter. We saw a car's headlights stop down the beach and pause as if they also saw it. A nearby truck parked perpendicular to the waterturned its headlights on, and a light flickered off in the camper up the beach. There was easily 4 or 5 people illuminated by moonlight stopped, about a mile down the beach and pointing out to sea. IWe had noticed earlier (about 8 or 9 pm) in the evening 4-5 red lights floating around, moving like fireflies, after a little online research from my beach chair we decided they were probably chinese lanterns,What we thought at the time of the event: we spent several minutes discussing what we could be seeing, the following is what we came up with.:at first glance, we thought it was a Fishing Vessel on fire and watched for a moment, we had seen FVs earlier that evening and could see that this was to large and bright, and moving to fast and to distinctly to be a fishing vessel, especially one on fire. We then speculated it could be a coast guard search helicopter, if someone had gone out swimming or missing earlier in the day, there would be a coast guard response. but we didn't hear any chopper blades or engine noises, although my boyfriend heard a "distant, High piched squeal", the only real reason we thought it was a Coast Guard helicopter was because the "searchlight" was the Beam of orange light that illuminated an area the size of a beach balloon the beach, the light was over a mile away and out to sea and covering a distance of almost 30 miles in less than a minute pointing its light on the beach, moving at speeds that would be impractical for search vehicles.There has been a noticeable amount of military air movement (Chinooks, armed helicopters, etc) a few miles inland over the last several months, and there are naval bases on the beach further north, so my initial assumption was a military exersize, but then why would the military be active in such a way on the most popular beach day of the year when literally thousands of people were on that beach just a few hours earlier and dozens still were, their campfires dotted the beach for miles. To us it seemed the "beam" emanating from the light was scanning the beach almost mapping it per se because of the movement of the light ( in a past job I used a scanner all day every day, the movement of the source light reminded me of, the parts of a copier or scanner just beneath the glass) whatever it was it was obviously there, doing something, and not being interfered with and everyone on the beach knew they saw it.