2003-06-07 - Oakland, CA - Cylinder

Large, gray cylindrical object at or near Oakland Airport

I was driving north on Interstate 880 just before the Oakland Coliseum and Arena , in the vicinity of the Oakland International Airport. Off to the left, about a mile or two away over some low buildings, I saw what looked like a large, gray, cylindrical shaped object with no wings and no lights that looked like it possibly could have been descending into the airport, going down behind the freeway sound wall after several seconds of observation. I thought maybe it was a blimp that possibly had been flying over the nearby arena, but I called both the Oakland Airport and the Coliseum/Arena today on Monday - and both people I spoke with stated that there were no blimps in the area at that time that they are aware of. The time was definitely 7:53 PM PDT, as I looked at my dashboard car clock and noted the time on purpose. It was just about sunset, and there were some scattered "marine layer" clouds in the area, but these were much higher than the object that I observed. I saw no other traditonal aircraft in the vicinity. I would estimate the object was at an altitude of several hundred to a thousand feet when I saw it and then it descended fairly quickly out of sight toward to the ground at a seemingly sharper angle than a plane would have. Anyone else driving north at that time on 880 would have been able to possibly see it also, so there may be more witnesses out there as traffic on the freeway was fairly busy. This object apparently landed or went down very close to the ground, and it was much too large to have been one of those advertising mini blimp balloons on a string. I didn't even try to listen for a sound because the object was too distant, and any sound it made would have been obliterated by all the engine noises on the freeway.