2010-08-26 - Chicago, IL - Sphere

Strange Craft Descends from Sky in Chicago and exits the night sky rapidly to the North East

On 8/26/2010 at 9:03pm CST I witnessed a UFO through my deck sliding glass doorway. I was looking out the window in a north east direction and contemplating taking my telescope out to view the night sky as the moon was very bright in the eastern sky low above the trees. I was looking at the constellation Cassiopeia when there was a bright star that began to descend from the constellation. As it descend it got brighter and very large then began to move in a north eastern direction rapidly. The total experience was less than 1 minute.

Background: I often lay on my couch watching television and look out a 6’wide by 10’ high sliding glass patio doorway. When looking out the sliding glass doors I am facing in a north eastern direction. My wife and I live somewhat near the O’Hare Airport and are in the direct line of incoming and outgoing air traffic. So, I am very familiar with aircraft and their appearance both in daylight and dark night skies. I have seen aircraft flying low and high and feel I can tell the difference between aircraft and what I saw on 8/26/2010 at 9:03pm.

9:03pm 8/26/2010: I had spent the evening noticing how the sky was clear and how the moon was very bright and low in the eastern sky. At approximately 8:50pm CST I noticed a bright star below the moon and wondered if it was a planet. I took a walk back into a spare room where I keep my 10” Orion Dobsonian Telescope. But as it was going to be too much trouble to take it out of the storage closet I decided against it. I walked back to the living room and lay upon the couch and was looking at the constellation Cassiopeia and noticed that from out of view above the sliding glass door a star was getting brighter and looked as though it was descending directly from the constellation. Over the next few second the star got very large, bright white and began to slow its descent. At this point I called for my wife in our bedroom reading a book to please look out the window, as the bedroom window are on the same north eastern facing wall. She said she could not see a thing, as I assumed she had alrea! dy closed the drapes as she always does. As this conversation was happening the object had gotten very large and stopped descending. It was at a magnitude I have never witnessed before. My wife did come out of the room and asked what I wanted her to see, as my request was unusual and I was shocked at what was happening and I think she could hear that in my voice. I continued to observe the object and it got suddenly got very bright and moved in a north easterly direction rapidly. When she joined me at the sliding glass door, I pointed out the object and she said “you mean that star”. When my wife said “you mean that star”, the object had already become about an 15th of its largest size and had moved out and away from us. It moved rapidly and then disappeared into the sky in that same direction. She said it probably was plane, but she had not witnessed the full event.

Conclusion: In the two years I have been living here and observing the night sky and passage of commercial planes I have never witnessed anything like this before. The object I saw was round and moved like nothing I had ever seen before. It descended rapidly from what appeared to be a small star to a large round object. It hovered for a second before rapidly moving out of sight. There were no blinking lights on the object like on the commercial craft that fly overhead constantly. And as this was a clear night I am an amateur astronomer I cannot identify what it was that I witnessed. My only conclusion would be to say that this was an UFO.