2013-07-04 - Elk Grove, CA - Light

Preface: there are plenty of commercial planes, private planes, military planes and helicopters with Sac Int Airport, military, and small craft airports around, and I have seen enough to recognize this as none of the above. There were planes in the sky at this same time. Head-on, you may see a very bright light, but they always show flashing, colored lights at some point in their flight. I was intentionally sitting out back by the pool watching the sky, with the hope of seeing a UFO on the 4th of July.... again. I saw a similar one (not quite the same... 4 lights under one vehicle) 2 years ago, but did not look long for one last 4th of July. This sighting consisted of a bright light coming out of the south, directly at me, in the far distance.

After a few seconds I could see that it wasn't one light, but two. When I could see the clear separation between the lights, I watched as the vehicle slowly turned 90 degrees to the east (as the two lights merged into one with the turn), proceeded a short distance east, stopped for a few seconds (as to watch some fireworks below?), slowly backed up and turned onto the original flight path (as one light again became two), then continued almost directly over me at a fairly low altitude (lower than any passing commercial jet and somewhere close to single engine private plane low to medium altitude). It was silent and flying faster than any plane, jet or prop, but not super fast. It continued to the northwest and disappeared toward the big dipper at a constant rate of speed. I estimate the total time I saw it from horizon to horizon was about a minute. No plane that we have would clear that distance in that time at that low altitude and not make a sound.