Strange Object Flying over California's northern valley.

Over the night sky around 7:59-8:01 pm facing south I was standing in my driveway smoking a cigarette, when in the sky appeared a oval object that was descending rapidly north-west. It lasted in sight for no more then 3 seconds.
It had a orange fiery trail behind it,the frontal part of the descending object had a kinda opal glow on the front side as it fell.  The sky was open in front of me no trees blocked my view,also it appeared as if the object had slowed its decent after a second of me noticing it,it had slowed by what I would calculate as 30-40% maybe the strange part was after only seeing it for a few seconds it vanished as if it had flown behind something I couldn't see, the trail of orange followed into the same absence of sight.