1969-08-17 - North Hollywood, CA - Sphere

Was up late watching TV and glanced out of nearby window to witness 6-7 bright orange lights to the south about half of a mile away.

North Hollywood:13061 Vanowen St. Second Floor apartment bedroom window facing southward. Church and unobscured clear weather view of the sky in direct path. Got up to change channel on TV and was drwn towards the window by bright orange glowing objects outside and to the south behind the church. Six Objects in formation. One other that was much lower and cruising appoximately one hundred feet above the power lines. They came over the apartments where I was living and I could see them quite clearly from the center courtyard second floor catwalk. They (6) stopped in mid flight just when passing to my direct west and abruptly changed direction from due north to west. I'd say that they were each about the size of a quarter at arms length away from the body. The rogue ship that was lower never did come up above the horizon from where I was watching this. At this point a neighbor was awakened by what he thought was an explosion and came outside to where I was standing with another person to watch the sighting. I did not hear any noise from the objects during the ten minutes that they were in my complete view. As they ascended at 45 degrees azimuth they seemed to be shooting sparks out from the rear and I could see small silvery disks being ejected from the object that were not illuminated except from the orange glow of the UFO. They quickly were lost sight of after they descended into the darkness. At this time three other presons were returning home from a late night poker game and immediately came up the catwalk to see what was going on. This was approximately 8 minutes after they were first spotted by myself. The next day I talked to another of my neighbors who also witnessed it but was too frightened to come outside and watch it with us. After nine minutes of observation the two objects to the right and left of the center object blinked out. The remaining two objects sped off at a fantastic rate of speed. I could still see them for only a few more seconds before they were out of my vision range. After the sighting was over we called the local radio station (KGIL) to report the sighting. The overnight board operator said that he received one other report from someone in Van Nuys, CA. The next morning, we called the local US Air Force to report the sighting. the officer told us, "We do not know what they are." Also, I observed a LAPD patrol car going down Vanowen St. at Ethel Avenue to the West. I not sure if he saw it too. But, I think that it would have been very visible to anyone that managed to be outside and looking up. I managed to somehow snap a single photo from a Kodak instamatic 126 camera of a single object. It was not very impressive! But, I still have the negative available. Unfortunately, I didn't remember taking the photograph until four years later! So, It was in the early 70's that we finally had it developed.