As big as a large house with 2 car garage attached and kinda shaped like that 500 feet over my head..
Something I am having a hard time explaining flew right over my head what seemed like no more than 500 feet up at Washington Elementary School at about 1:45am... as big as a large house with 2 car garage attached and kinda shaped like that..
At about 1am I went up to the darkened school yard alone to see if maybe I could catch a few early annual Perseid meteors shooting across from the North sky. I was disappointed to notice the installation of new security lights in my favorite urban astronomy field, which actually do nothing but cause light pollution and burn energy... so I decided to lay in the middle of some playground equipment where the shadows would cover me and give me a much darker if slightly more limited view of the sky. I was laying with my head to the west and feet to the east so the meteors would appear to my left and fly to the right. It was a slow show, but a pretty clear night. I could barely make out the faint glow of the Milky Way. I saw about 5 bright Perseids over the course of approximately 45 minutes, when something enormous and low appeared directly in front and above me to the East-southeast.
When I say enormous I mean it seemed like a large house with 2 car attached garage was flying over my head. As soon as my eyes flicked to it, It was directly over me. Although it was dark with no Moon, the craft was darker, like it absorbed light. Its hard to explain the shape. Like 5 or 6 or 7 black square boxes connected oddly, sort of like a 3 box rectangle with 2 other box protrusions on either side 1 front and 1 back, with a large orange circle in the center of each square 2/3rds the square size. The orange glow did not seem to be lights, but more like very hot orange glowing metal. There were no running lights what so ever. I got the impression it was much larger than I could actually see, and was not supposed to be able to see it, but the orange heat glow lit up just a small portion of the bottom of the craft which is all I really saw.
Although the square and circles were symmetrical, the boxes seemed to be put together in an odd shape. I came home and drew it and painted it but I cant get it to look exactly like what I saw but you can at least get an idea. This craft did not seem aerodynamic in any way, yet it was flying super fast, Lear jet fast, although flying is the wrong word. More like it moved like a waterbug across the surface of water, or dragonfly like... kinda skiddering diagonally sideways..
It passed directly over me and shot off West Northwest. As it passed I flipped over on my stomach and elbows to get a better view and t disappeared over some trees that fast. The whole event lasted less than 30 seconds. Not a single sound came from it. The crickets kept on chirping. There was no wind. It was very calm. An odd thing seemed that maybe it was moving slowly or standing still until my eyes flicked to it, and it shot off straight over me. I do not know if it was watching me or was it just moving over when it saw me an decided to take off? I was kinda hidden by some steel playground equipment..
I have seen strange things in the sky before, but nothing even remotely close to this.
I know what satellites look like. I know what the ISS space station looks like. I know what comets and asteroids and meteors look like. I own a 6" Newtonian reflector telescope. I have been to military air shows before. I know what planes and helicopters and blimps are capable of. Although I have never seen swamp gas ignite I am pretty sure this was not that either! I saw what I saw. As to who was driving that remains to be seen! I have another sighting posted on here where I saw 3 black V triangles in the same schoolyard, which happened 11 years ago. I would like to add that looking back I think the sightings are connected, and from pictures I have seen I think they are the same type of craft that was over Phoenix Arizona in 1996 the same year, but in my case they were much much higher and therefore smaller. And there were 3 of them.
Just my speculation but it seems to me as if these lights/boxes can move together like an F-16 wings retract and expand for higher speeds, but not for the same reasons. They move from V to more wide mouthed U and boomerang shapes, and now I think they can form any shape, maybe even come apart and move freely and then rejoin at different angles.
Keep looking up!
Something I am having a hard time explaining flew right over my head what seemed like no more than 500 feet up at Washington Elementary School at about 1:45am... as big as a large house with 2 car garage attached and kinda shaped like that..
At about 1am I went up to the darkened school yard alone to see if maybe I could catch a few early annual Perseid meteors shooting across from the North sky. I was disappointed to notice the installation of new security lights in my favorite urban astronomy field, which actually do nothing but cause light pollution and burn energy... so I decided to lay in the middle of some playground equipment where the shadows would cover me and give me a much darker if slightly more limited view of the sky. I was laying with my head to the west and feet to the east so the meteors would appear to my left and fly to the right. It was a slow show, but a pretty clear night. I could barely make out the faint glow of the Milky Way. I saw about 5 bright Perseids over the course of approximately 45 minutes, when something enormous and low appeared directly in front and above me to the East-southeast.
When I say enormous I mean it seemed like a large house with 2 car attached garage was flying over my head. As soon as my eyes flicked to it, It was directly over me. Although it was dark with no Moon, the craft was darker, like it absorbed light. Its hard to explain the shape. Like 5 or 6 or 7 black square boxes connected oddly, sort of like a 3 box rectangle with 2 other box protrusions on either side 1 front and 1 back, with a large orange circle in the center of each square 2/3rds the square size. The orange glow did not seem to be lights, but more like very hot orange glowing metal. There were no running lights what so ever. I got the impression it was much larger than I could actually see, and was not supposed to be able to see it, but the orange heat glow lit up just a small portion of the bottom of the craft which is all I really saw.
Although the square and circles were symmetrical, the boxes seemed to be put together in an odd shape. I came home and drew it and painted it but I cant get it to look exactly like what I saw but you can at least get an idea. This craft did not seem aerodynamic in any way, yet it was flying super fast, Lear jet fast, although flying is the wrong word. More like it moved like a waterbug across the surface of water, or dragonfly like... kinda skiddering diagonally sideways..
It passed directly over me and shot off West Northwest. As it passed I flipped over on my stomach and elbows to get a better view and t disappeared over some trees that fast. The whole event lasted less than 30 seconds. Not a single sound came from it. The crickets kept on chirping. There was no wind. It was very calm. An odd thing seemed that maybe it was moving slowly or standing still until my eyes flicked to it, and it shot off straight over me. I do not know if it was watching me or was it just moving over when it saw me an decided to take off? I was kinda hidden by some steel playground equipment..
I have seen strange things in the sky before, but nothing even remotely close to this.
I know what satellites look like. I know what the ISS space station looks like. I know what comets and asteroids and meteors look like. I own a 6" Newtonian reflector telescope. I have been to military air shows before. I know what planes and helicopters and blimps are capable of. Although I have never seen swamp gas ignite I am pretty sure this was not that either! I saw what I saw. As to who was driving that remains to be seen! I have another sighting posted on here where I saw 3 black V triangles in the same schoolyard, which happened 11 years ago. I would like to add that looking back I think the sightings are connected, and from pictures I have seen I think they are the same type of craft that was over Phoenix Arizona in 1996 the same year, but in my case they were much much higher and therefore smaller. And there were 3 of them.
Just my speculation but it seems to me as if these lights/boxes can move together like an F-16 wings retract and expand for higher speeds, but not for the same reasons. They move from V to more wide mouthed U and boomerang shapes, and now I think they can form any shape, maybe even come apart and move freely and then rejoin at different angles.
Keep looking up!
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Off
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Plymouth
USA
30 seconds
30 seconds
41.35
-86.31
formation
IN
Occurred : 8/12/2007 01:45 (Entered as : 08/12/07 1:45) Reported: 8/15/2007 3:06:10 AM 03:06 Posted: 10/8/2007 Location: Plymouth, IN Shape: Formation Duration: 30 seconds
As big as a large house with 2 car garage attached and kinda shaped like that 500 feet over my head..