2002-01-12 - Portland, OR - Light

Sighting of lights over willamette river in Portland, OR Saturday 1/12/02 @ 4:10pm near two rainbows

I have never in my life seen anything like I saw today on my way to a movie in NW Portland. We were travelling north on Macadam Boulevard right near the industrial area on the west bank of the willamette river when I looked up and noticed two rainbows that broke off mid way up in the sky as above them loomed a thick cloud formation that covered most of the eastern sky. While examining the rainbows my girlfriend (who was driving at the moment) noticed little lights which were floating either in front of or within the cloud formation. The lights, looked EXACTLY like stars but it was 4:10pm in the afternoon and they appeared to be in front of the clouds. There were 6-10 lights all hovering and moving both in formation and separately (I definitely counted 6 I could see at one given time while my girlfriend claimed to see as many as 10 at one given time). These were not like any planes I have ever seen as they remained stationary and were able to move back and forth in relation to one another with surprising speed and no need for turning radii. One moved in the northern direction, then stopped on a dime, hovered for a while and then returned in the direction it originally came from. They moved quite quickly and seemed quite agile. The group of lights occupied no more than 35 degrees of the sky horizontally and all appeared around the same altitude (guesstimate of 200-300 feet high) Neither one of us could tell the size or distance of the lights as they appeared as little more than pin pricks of light but we both agreed that they appeared to be somewhat close and the way they moved only heightened that sensation. If I had to guess I would say they were no more than 2-3 football fields away. This is my first UFO experience and I hope other people were looking in the direction of the rainbows and can back up our story. Did anybody else see this? I have no idea what they were but it was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen.