black cigar/rectangular shape, silent. no wings. winks out along flight path
2011 July 17 Sunday 1545 hrs EDT I would not have considered reporting this except for what it apparently did along its flight path.
Over Ashburn, VA Mostly clear blue sky, very little haze, small cotton-ball bright- white cumulous clouds, some larger dark cumulous. Temperature 90’s F I was in back yard, sitting in chair, facing NNE. Reading book, smoking cigar. No alcohol, no medicine.
I had a pressure or tension I should look straight up.
Immediately after looking straight up, object appeared in motion entering view from neighbor’s roof line from SSW direction. Flew straight line from overhead to NNE. Flight path would place it as coming from between Leesburg Airport and Dulles Airport.
Easily resolvable in detail except for indistinct longitudinal patch of silver/white/black at rear of object.
Generally a cigar shape or rectangular shape with angular-to-rounded ends at front and rear.
No wings. No delta shape. No stubs on sides. No tail appendages.
Silent. No engine sounds. No air rushing past "fuselage" area.
No vapor trail. No smoke trail.
Precise straight line and constant velocity flight.
Hard to determine size of object and its altitude, since it had no wings, and it was not an organic (fowl such as goose, hawk, duck, etc) Sharp contrast of straight black edges of "fuselage" to blue sky and to white clouds it passed under.
Flying under base of clouds provided limit to estimate of altitude.
My feeling of my eyes focusing on the object gave a sense that I was focusing at infinity focus, meaning, I can only estimate object was from 600-feet to less than 10,000-feet altitude.
Bottom of object was solid black and non-reflective. No Gaussian distribution of any reflected light, giving sense that bottom was flat or nearly flat and matte or was a complete light absorbent.
Could never focus on indistinct rear area.
As it was nearing a virtual intersection (my point of view) with another small white cloud, while still in blue sky, with a large gap of blue sky between it and the cloud ahead, while easily resolvable in size, color, shape, contrast, while not shrinking via perspective lines into a dot, while not fading and not blending with the sky’s water vapor, It discretely winked out.
It suddenly, instantaneously disappeared.
Testing the idea the object may be a science test of visibility cloaking (contrast reduction technique), I expected to see a silhouette of it against the cloud wall as its path would lead it there in the next 4 seconds. No silhouette appeared.
I would not expect a test of dynamic adaptable contrast to occur from my observer’s point of view while it transitioned from one level of background luminosity (the sky) to another (the cloud column); I was not involved in any such test; There was no apparent observer’s station in sight.
There was no deviation in pitch, roll, or yaw before it winked out.
Time of duration of sighting: approximately 7 seconds as object transitioned from observer’s initial overhead sighting to its discreet and sudden disappearance.
Angles of transition: approximately 90 degrees (from occultation by neighbor’s roof line) to approximately 45 degrees before it suddenly winked out.
Felt no emotional reaction.
Was reflective on uncanny sensation of feeling need to look up just in time to see it emerge from roof line. Perfect timing. My seated position was facing NNE, as was direction of object.
Fig. 1.
Apparent shape of object on first sighting (overhead): “#” denotes tail area of fuzzy silver/white/black striping.
Top is tail from observer’s point of view.
Bottom is nose heading NNE from observer’s point of view.
((NUFORC Note: The images of the object, rendered by the witness, using ASCII characters, did not survive the transfer from the report form to our database. PD))
_ /#\ | | | | | | | | | \ / V Fig. 2.
Apparent shape of object downrange just before it instantaneously disappeared: Sun direction is from the left and downward on object.
_ |#| | | | | winks out here \ / | X .
Apparent separation of object and cloud.
Sky is denoted as "." Cloud is denoted as "@ ".
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Fig. 3.
Approximate and crude shape of flying object while overhead.
Top part is forward or “nose” heading NNE.
Bottom part is rear or “tail”.
Rotate shape 180 degrees to place it into frame of observer’s point of view.
-------- / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ | | | | | | | | | | | | | solid black | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | @ @ @ @ @ |
|# # # # # # #|
2011 July 17 Sunday 1545 hrs EDT I would not have considered reporting this except for what it apparently did along its flight path.
Over Ashburn, VA Mostly clear blue sky, very little haze, small cotton-ball bright- white cumulous clouds, some larger dark cumulous. Temperature 90’s F I was in back yard, sitting in chair, facing NNE. Reading book, smoking cigar. No alcohol, no medicine.
I had a pressure or tension I should look straight up.
Immediately after looking straight up, object appeared in motion entering view from neighbor’s roof line from SSW direction. Flew straight line from overhead to NNE. Flight path would place it as coming from between Leesburg Airport and Dulles Airport.
Easily resolvable in detail except for indistinct longitudinal patch of silver/white/black at rear of object.
Generally a cigar shape or rectangular shape with angular-to-rounded ends at front and rear.
No wings. No delta shape. No stubs on sides. No tail appendages.
Silent. No engine sounds. No air rushing past "fuselage" area.
No vapor trail. No smoke trail.
Precise straight line and constant velocity flight.
Hard to determine size of object and its altitude, since it had no wings, and it was not an organic (fowl such as goose, hawk, duck, etc) Sharp contrast of straight black edges of "fuselage" to blue sky and to white clouds it passed under.
Flying under base of clouds provided limit to estimate of altitude.
My feeling of my eyes focusing on the object gave a sense that I was focusing at infinity focus, meaning, I can only estimate object was from 600-feet to less than 10,000-feet altitude.
Bottom of object was solid black and non-reflective. No Gaussian distribution of any reflected light, giving sense that bottom was flat or nearly flat and matte or was a complete light absorbent.
Could never focus on indistinct rear area.
As it was nearing a virtual intersection (my point of view) with another small white cloud, while still in blue sky, with a large gap of blue sky between it and the cloud ahead, while easily resolvable in size, color, shape, contrast, while not shrinking via perspective lines into a dot, while not fading and not blending with the sky’s water vapor, It discretely winked out.
It suddenly, instantaneously disappeared.
Testing the idea the object may be a science test of visibility cloaking (contrast reduction technique), I expected to see a silhouette of it against the cloud wall as its path would lead it there in the next 4 seconds. No silhouette appeared.
I would not expect a test of dynamic adaptable contrast to occur from my observer’s point of view while it transitioned from one level of background luminosity (the sky) to another (the cloud column); I was not involved in any such test; There was no apparent observer’s station in sight.
There was no deviation in pitch, roll, or yaw before it winked out.
Time of duration of sighting: approximately 7 seconds as object transitioned from observer’s initial overhead sighting to its discreet and sudden disappearance.
Angles of transition: approximately 90 degrees (from occultation by neighbor’s roof line) to approximately 45 degrees before it suddenly winked out.
Felt no emotional reaction.
Was reflective on uncanny sensation of feeling need to look up just in time to see it emerge from roof line. Perfect timing. My seated position was facing NNE, as was direction of object.
Fig. 1.
Apparent shape of object on first sighting (overhead): “#” denotes tail area of fuzzy silver/white/black striping.
Top is tail from observer’s point of view.
Bottom is nose heading NNE from observer’s point of view.
((NUFORC Note: The images of the object, rendered by the witness, using ASCII characters, did not survive the transfer from the report form to our database. PD))
_ /#\ | | | | | | | | | \ / V Fig. 2.
Apparent shape of object downrange just before it instantaneously disappeared: Sun direction is from the left and downward on object.
_ |#| | | | | winks out here \ / | X .
Apparent separation of object and cloud.
Sky is denoted as "." Cloud is denoted as "@ ".
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ Fig. 3.
Approximate and crude shape of flying object while overhead.
Top part is forward or “nose” heading NNE.
Bottom part is rear or “tail”.
Rotate shape 180 degrees to place it into frame of observer’s point of view.
-------- / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ | | | | | | | | | | | | | solid black | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | @ @ @ @ @ |
|# # # # # # #|
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Off
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Ashburn
USA
7 seconds
7 seconds
39.04
-77.50
cigar
VA
Occurred : 7/17/2011 15:45 (Entered as : 07/17/11 15:45) Reported: 7/18/2011 8:35:58 PM 20:35 Posted: 8/7/2011 Location: Ashburn, VA Shape: Cigar Duration: 7 seconds
black cigar/rectangular shape, silent. no wings. winks out along flight path