1996-08-30 - Blacksburg, VA - Sphere

Two witnesses, no more than 40 feet from bright white sphere 3 1/2 - 4 feet in diameter blocking our way on rd.

My friend J* and I, both around 20 years old, were having coffee in Blacksburg around early evening (4-6 pm). We were quite bored and not quite sure what to do with our evening. (We had consumed NO alcohol and NO drugs. Just coffee/tea.) J* suggested visiting an abandoned house on a Mountain just outside of Blacksburg called Brush Mountain (Turn left onto country road off of Rt 460 on the way towards West Virginia, the house is now gone). The house was used infrequently by high school kids and college students for late night parties. It was old (1930s to 1940s) and apparently neat to visit since it had a great view of Blacksburg and was kind of a creepy old house. I conceded to the idea and we left, with no idea what we were in for.

We arrived at the house with some difficulty since the country road, not much wider than one car width, was washed out in spots and very bumpy. There were ditches on both sides of the road making it impossible to turn around while on it.

After smoking a few cigarettes(tobacco, not pot. I am very serious here.)and inspecting the house, we realized that it was getting dark and we had no flashlights. We decided to leave. We got in the car and made our way back down the same country road.

I must confess that I have a hard time remembering "coming up on" the object. I think it was such a shock first seeing it that I can't remember how we came upon it. I THINK that we came over a hump in the road and all of a sudden there it was in the middle of the road approximately 35-40 feet away. The way the road was, you couldn't see all the way down it, it would curve up and then down occasionally, until it finally took you back to Rt 460. I am actually a little bothered by not remembering the minutes just before seeing it, but I don't think this is a case of missing time.

J* slowed the car to a crawl and finally stopped approximately 30-35 feet from the object. It may have been closer than that. I am trying to be as conservative as possible in regards to distance. It was absolutely no more than 40 feet away from us at any time during the encounter-I have personally walked the distance and I am positive of this fact.

The object was a glowing ball of light, a perfect sphere approximately 3 1/2 to 4 feet in diameter. It was hovering, without "bobbing" or moving at all, approximately 2 1/2 - 3 feet off of the ground, perfectly still, in the middle of the road. Not to the left, not to the right-but dead center in the middle. It made no sound at all.

J* and I were so shocked, we locked the doors to the car and made sure the windows were tightly closed (rolled up). Of course this sounds ridiculous, but it seemed the right thing to do at the time. After exclaiming to each other with numerous expletives, etc. I seem to remember J* driving a little closer. I'm not sure how much closer, but it wasn't much. There was no way, as I indicated earlier, of turning around on the road. We stared at the object for approximately 1 minute. I have timed this by running over the events in real time (initial shock/locking doors/taking briefly/then staring.

I turned to J* after this minute and said "Turn your brights on it". J* turned on his brights and left them on. Immediately the sphere rose up apporximately 2-3 feet more, paused, and then TOOK OFF down the road at a speed that to this day I find hard to explain or even describe. Fast. Very, very fast. You could see the illusion of a tail or the object elongated for a 1/2 second as it took off. Again, with no sound.

J* tried to talk, but we were both in shock. I said something, also laced with expletives, to the effect of "Get me off this ******* Mountain and then we can talk about it!" We had to, of course, go down the road to get back to 460. And this was also were the sphere had gone. It did not take off going up but down the very road we needed to traverse. I remember our eyes were peeled on that road until we got back down to the highway. We got back into town, banged on a friends apartment until they let us in and proceeded to FREAK OUT for hours over the incident.

For many years I have described this object as a ghost and the encounter as a ghost story. There is a good reason for this. The object, which we both saw in the GREATEST DETAIL, was rather "ghostly". This is very important and I want investigators (Govt. or otherwise) to take note of this. Whipping around the sphere was a wispy, plasma like substance, almost exactly the type of thing we associate with ghosts. None of this substance extended more than a half foot away from the sphere and was constantly in motion around it. The object was very bright, but did not seem to light the area around it very much. I would say that the sphere itself was luminous "white" or a "colorless" kind of white, and the substance around it was only slightly darker. And by darker I mean it was white too, but more off white. Beneath this plasma that was constantly whipping around, the object was a PERFECT SPHERE. Not oval, but mathematically spherical.

I do not know what I saw, but I saw it at very close range. I am to understand that this qualifies as a close encounter of the first kind.

The date I entered is an approximation, but I have been able to deduce that the encounter absolutely occurred in late Summer of 1996. My friend whose apartment we visited right after the encounter only lived in that apartment during this time.

I am very sorry that we did not get a picture of the object, but this was before cell phone cameras and we had no idea we would need a camera beforehand. So frustrating.

Cordially, K*


((NUFORC Note: Witness indicates that the date is approximate. PD))