Dark grey sphere over Pacific Coast Highway - Santa Monica CA.
While watching red-tailed hawks from the Palisades Park in Santa Monica CA. observed a dark grey spherical object approximately 500 feet over Pacific Coast Highway. Object caught my attention due to it's lack of motion. I assumed it was a tethered balloon, but given the variable wind conditions along the coast, from the west around 7 to 12 knots, I would have expected some wobbling or other motion from a tethered balloon.
I was facing west and the object was about 80° up from my vantage point. I observed it for about 5 to 10 minutes. I never saw any buffeting you'd expect with having a tethered balloon and variable wind conditions. Size was about a pea at arms distance.
Having a tethered object of any kind in that area would be at the very least reckless as it's common for low flying air craft such as helicopters and ad banner planes to fly through the area. That location is about 2 miles WNW up the coast from the very busy Santa Monica airport and it's common for aircraft to traverse at or below 500 feet going up or down the coast over the ocean to pass the western part of the airport departure route (typically runway 21).
I ran out of time and had to leave the area. Always been a curiosity. Haven't seen any thing similar at that location, but I did see a similar object about 2 months ago, 2 miles inland. I observed it through my 10x80 binoculars. It was partially obscured by some clouds. Probably less than 20 seconds of observation time. Similar attitude.
((NUFORC Note: Witness indicates that the date of the event is approximate. PD))
((NUFORC Note: Witness elects to remain totally anonymous; provides no contact information. PD))
While watching red-tailed hawks from the Palisades Park in Santa Monica CA. observed a dark grey spherical object approximately 500 feet over Pacific Coast Highway. Object caught my attention due to it's lack of motion. I assumed it was a tethered balloon, but given the variable wind conditions along the coast, from the west around 7 to 12 knots, I would have expected some wobbling or other motion from a tethered balloon.
I was facing west and the object was about 80° up from my vantage point. I observed it for about 5 to 10 minutes. I never saw any buffeting you'd expect with having a tethered balloon and variable wind conditions. Size was about a pea at arms distance.
Having a tethered object of any kind in that area would be at the very least reckless as it's common for low flying air craft such as helicopters and ad banner planes to fly through the area. That location is about 2 miles WNW up the coast from the very busy Santa Monica airport and it's common for aircraft to traverse at or below 500 feet going up or down the coast over the ocean to pass the western part of the airport departure route (typically runway 21).
I ran out of time and had to leave the area. Always been a curiosity. Haven't seen any thing similar at that location, but I did see a similar object about 2 months ago, 2 miles inland. I observed it through my 10x80 binoculars. It was partially obscured by some clouds. Probably less than 20 seconds of observation time. Similar attitude.
((NUFORC Note: Witness indicates that the date of the event is approximate. PD))
((NUFORC Note: Witness elects to remain totally anonymous; provides no contact information. PD))
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Santa Monica
USA
10 minutes
10 minutes
34.03
-118.47
sphere
CA
Occurred : 9/2/2006 15:00 (Entered as : 09/02/2006 15:00) Reported: 2/4/2008 7:51:35 PM 19:51 Posted: 3/4/2008 Location: Santa Monica, CA Shape: Sphere Duration: 10 minutes
Dark grey sphere over Pacific Coast Highway - Santa Monica CA.