The spiraling in might also be a kind of vertigo response as well. Normally the moon only goes up or down in your field of vision if you’re adjusting your angle

The spiraling in might also be a kind of vertigo response as well. Normally the moon only goes up or down in your field of vision if you’re adjusting your angle - pitching or rolling. But an artificial light source moves up or downwards if you’re changing altitude but maintaining attitude. That would make flying up past the light ‘feel like’ pitching away from it, which might cause autonomic steering responses, similar to inner ear/visual conflicts causing humans to stagger and fall over.