The 3 seconds of my life that has lasted 35 years

I had an experience about 36 years ago that I have never been able to come up with a logical explanation.  I believe it was the spring of 1982 or 1983. I looked up the precise area’s longitude and latitude at: 41.749178, -80.229146. (About 9 miles S-SW of Edinboro, Pa, and less than 5 miles Northwest of Saegertown, PA.
A friend of mine and I were sitting in a car about 1am.  It was pitch black as it normally would be at that time of night.  There was an old abandoned house with a circle driveway with high vegetation all around.
All of the sudden, the entire area around the car lit up like daytime.  The light only shined around the car about 25 feet seemingly in a circular pattern.  The light obviously was coming from above us.  Within 3 to 4 seconds, we both opened our doors and jumped out of the car.  The light went out about the time we were getting out, maybe right before.The incident lasted no more than 3 seconds.  We scanned the sky but heard nothing and saw nothing.  No airplane, no helicopter, nothing?  I’ve spoken to my friend about this several times over the years.  He remembers it just as I do but no explanation.  To this day, I have never forgotten this incident or have I ever come up with an explanation.  I keep telling myself that it must have  been a helicopter but,  It’s hard to live with that explanation because we both were looking to the sky for an obvious aircraft but there were none and no sounds could be heard.  This is almost embarrassing because I am now educated in the sciences and have never seen anything like this before or after but my experience of this recollection has not changed in over 35 years.