I was driving to work at the time of the event the I was facing west south west on highway 158 near the high point along the Bluff line shortly before the turnoff on to Illinois 3 north on the south end of Columbia, Il.At the time there was light scattered cloud cover and the moon was hazy in appearance.I noticed an extremely bright trail appearing in the left area of windshield the trail was moving north to northwest across. A path not uncommon to aircraft approaching St. Louis Lambert Airport. the brightness was on the order slightly less then that of an arc welder. The color was solid white.The length of the trail is hard to estimate but if I were to of held my thumb out at arm's length I am confident that the length would have been about twice the width of my thumb. The object did not appear to be much about eye level I would say apx. 10 degrees above the horizon perhaps less.I lost sight of the trail after it crossed about 80% of my windshield in about 2 seconds. This is extremly fast when compared to normal air travel.