2020-05-01 - Quincy, WA - Light

The two of us were out after dark talking when he noted a bright orange light coming toward us just above the horizon from the SE. It came to my view almost immediately from over the garage. We both noted that it was a bright orange light, but appearing to be glowing, maybe burning, with a somewhat fan-shaped brighter glow above it than in the lower 2/3s, around the light. It was bright enough to think it was a plane with its headlights on coming straight at us (probably even much brighter), only it was one large orange light, not a white pair of lights. At arm’s length, it was about the size of a pencil eraser. At first we thought it was very low, as it was moving very quickly in a straight line that went almost directly over us. At that time of the night the sky was still clear, with only a few clouds coming in from the SW. We had been looking at stars, so the sky was still quite visible, and pretty. There was no wind.

As it went over head, we listened for airplane sound and never heard any, even after it had completely disappeared to our NW. As it went over, it was clear that it was higher in the sky than we first thought – maybe 10,000’ or more. We get Seattle air traffic here regularly, and they are at 30,000’ as they go over and we can easily hear them.

After it passed, it grew dimmer, much faster than when it was coming at us. It was very bright the whole time it was coming at us, but as it passed, it was darker like it was the back of whatever was causing the light. We speculated that it might have been a satellite burning up, but I don’t think they travel SE-NW. We also thought it might be a meteor burning (which would explain the glow around it) but it never appeared to have a tail or burning debris falling off. Amazingly, it appeared to be traveling in a very straight line.

It disappeared over the mountains to our NW, somewhat south of Wenatchee. The whole duration of the event was probably only about a minute. Our time of the event will be pretty accurate, because I immediately went into the house and called my brother. The phone recorded my call time.

I am a retired Army officer and a retired school counselor, and my friend is still working with irrigation water equipment.

To us, it was a UFO – unidentified flying object – because we couldn’t identify it. We are sure it wasn’t a plane – jet or prop – or a local drone, because we never heard a sound out of it. Our best guess is a meteor, but it certainly wasn’t like any other we had seen.