2011-07-01 - Kinderhook, MI - Changing

Four witnesses see a black object fly overhead about 1,000 ft up and 300 yards away in clear evening light.

On the evening of July 1 2011, 3 others and I were witness to an unknown craft flying overhead. It was a clear, warm evening close to 8:30pm EST with only a slight breeze from the Northwest. There were few clouds in the sky and the cloud deck appeared to be several thousand feet for those that were present. We had just arrived at my mother’s home on Silver Lake in Kinderhook, Michigan, (South of Coldwater Michigan) and gotten our stuff unpacked. We were sitting outside of her garage watching my dog wandering around the yard, staring at the lake and just enjoying the beauty of the evening and being there.

Out of the west/southwest, I noticed a red light appear above the tree line, moving toward our location. That area has several smaller airports that many aeronautical enthusiasts frequent. It is common to see ‘things’ flying about. Given the topography of the area, it is generally easy to identify those enthusiasts and their machines quickly. This was not one of those things.

The light held a steady brilliant red glow as it approached the lake. About the time it reached the opposite shore line moving towards us, I began pointing and saying my son’s name to gain his attention. He looked where I was pointing and said ‘what is that?’ As he said that, the other two witnesses also looked at where I was pointing. It was moving about the speed of an ultra light aircraft as it came across the lake. Initially my son declared it a plane.

In my view, as others got a ‘fix’ on it and began looking intently, the red light went out. The craft continued across the lake towards us in darkness. It was initially the traditional ‘saucer’ shape round with a small dome. The size was roughly the size of a four-seated Cessna aircraft common in the area. The coloring was completely ink black. It passed overhead less than 300 yards away and about 1,000 feet above the ground, without sound. The harder I tried to look at it, the less I could see detail. Almost simultaneously, we all verbally declared that this was not a plane. This is where we all in our own ways began saying the ‘oh my god what is that’ and ‘that’s not a plane’ things to each other as it passed overhead.

I began asking for a camera or my binoculars. The cameras were still in our bags in our rooms, but my binoculars were right in the garage. My fiancée ran into the garage behind us and grabbed them for me. The rest of us never took our eyes off it.

There is a large farmer’s field across the street from my mother’s house, and during the time it took my fiancée to get those for me, the object had only just crossed the length of the field, heading north, northwest. I trained my binoculars on it (10x50 power) and was able to follow it with them until it passed below the tree line. As I watched the object, I tried to discern details such as wings, or edges to it. It appeared to alter shape slightly, as a loosely filled balloon would in a breeze. This was no balloon though. What continues to stand out in my mind is the blackness. No edges or details were visible at all within the boundaries of the objects outline. It was just blackness. It was kind of like watching a round black hole float across the sky, with its edges slightly blurred and its outline wobbling.

As I watched it approach the tops of the trees in the distance, the object made a subtle shift up and to its right, and then dove downward and left at a 45-degree angle. It disappeared behind the treetops and I could not locate it after that.

It was not until several stunned moments afterwards, that I realized it had not made a sound. I mentioned that, and everyone was again stunned and in agreement in realizing that it in fact did not make a sound. Considering how close it was to us, there was no way we could not have heard even the smallest of engines. It is very quiet and calm out there and you can hear even just birds from a long distance off. This made absolutely no sound whatsoever.

My mother has lived there for many years now, and I have seen all types of aircraft and balloons launched from local airports. This was none of those things. It was far too light outside and too clear, for us to mistake it for anything else at that distance. Normal aircraft flying overhead at that altitude are very visible and audible to the point of almost being able to read their call signs with the naked eye and tell how many cylinders the aircraft is running on. It was also traveling across the mild breeze at about a 45-degree angle, and I feel confident in ruling out a free-floating balloon based on that alone. We do not know what we seen, but we all seen something truly amazing.