2014-12-10 - Litchfield Park, AZ - Formation

Multiple lights in the sky in Litchfield Park Arizona

I'm a 45 year old college graduate. My job is a server admin at a local utility. I'm also familiar with many types of aircraft and the flight paths around my area. I considered myself to be educated and use good logic. In the past I've seen things in the sky that at first I could not explain, however on further thought I am able to determine what I had seen in logical terms. This is the first time I could not come to a logical reason for what I saw.

I just finished up being an aide in my son’s Religious Education class at Church and was walking to my automobile. Out of my left eye, I caught an orange light in the sky to the North. I then turned to look at it and noticed several more objects in trail, not flying in any sort of formation.

I then looked to the Northwest in the direction of Luke Air Force Base and saw several others appearing from that direction. After viewing in Church parking lots for several minutes and taking two pictures, my son and I drove about a half mile north.

The objects were almost directly over us at this point, and appeared to be a round flat light. I took another picture. As I was viewing them the lights appeared to go straight up and disappear into a thin cloud.

We drive about 1,100 feet east from the point to get a better view. One last object appeared from same direction as others; however this one appeared to be larger than others. This last object disappeared straight up before I could u! nlock my phone to take a picture.

This was not in any flight pattern I’ve seen in the 12 years living in this area. And I could look behind and above me to see the normal pattern of planes flying in/out of Sky Harbor and through its air space.

At first I thought they might have been military helicopters. However I’ve seen flights of helicopters out of the Arizona National Guard base before and they tend to fly in formation and lower. Also each object had only one light with no visible tail rotor light. Further I ruled out hot air balloons because the lights were two small for that (the entire balloon usually lights up at night).

Next thought was that I was seeing afterburners on jets out of Luke AFB. But this did not fit either. Flights out of the AFB are usually around four to six jets, and flying in some sort of formation. Also with 30 plus fighter jets in afterburners, the noise would have been horrendous. These objects made no observable sounds. Also if these were jets, they would have been moving much quicker in horizontal flight.

My final thought was they could be Chinese lanterns. However since they flew nearly level for quite some time and then went vertical, this would rule them out. Balloons with some sort of light attached to them. Further given the proximity to Luke AFB and Glendale Airport, I find it hard to believe that a group would get permission for such a launch.