2021-01-01 - Tempe, AZ - Sphere

Six orange/red orbs one by one flew over Tempe AZ new years eve 2020 over 18 min from low altitude to disappearing into space

At midnight new years eve 2020, a friend and I observed six silent dark orange/red spherical glowing flying objects over an 18 minute time period. They appeared one by one, about every three minutes, from midnight to 12:18 AM.

Five of the objects moved from my east to my west, and one moved from my northwest to my southeast. The first two objects were a little north of me, the second two almost directly overhead, and the last two a little south of my location.

The objects first appeared at about a 40 degree angle to ground position, and appeared about 1/5 the size of an average moon when passing over our position. They looked like large military helicopter size, but as they steadily moved forward, away and upward, they appeared smaller and smaller, until they disappeared into space on the distant horizon. It took about three minutes from initial sighting, at what appeared as lower altitude, to disappearance, at what appeared to we extremely high altitude. It was difficult to estimate altitude, but I first thought the first object was a sheriff's helicopter, at low altitude, coming because of new years gunshots.

Upon two of the objects, one by one, disappearance in the eastern sky, I saw four separate blue/white flashes/sparks in the dark sky, near where the objects were last seen. They looked like photo flash bulbs or sparks going off in the sky, roughly the diameter of an average moon. I have never seen anything like that, and the sparks occurred at a very high altitude.

Before the last object traveled from the NW to the SE, I ran in an grabbed my 15X x 70mm Celestron astronomical binoculars. I was able to focus and view the last object clearly for over 10 seconds, as it was moving away. It appeared to be reddish orange glowing perfectly spherical plasma (there was a flaming character to it), with a round white halo around it. The halo was six times the size of the ball. The halo reflected white light against some slight feathery clouds that were present. There was no trail, contrail, or exhaust coming from the object.

I have worked in aerospace and defense procurement and manufacturing, for over 40 years. I know what satellites look like in the night sky. I know what helicopters and jet aircraft look like in the night sky. These objects were UAP, and exibited high strangeness. I know Sky Harbor tower had to have seen the objects, but, I no longer have any FAA contacts to refer to.

I waited for an hour after 12:18 AM to see if there would be further activity, and there was none. It is worthy of note that my internet search that night found videos of orange/red orbs captured at midnight new years eve 2020 in over 10 US states, and in Autrailia, The Netherlands, The UK, Mexico, and others. These videos match what we saw, only our sightings seemed much closer at first viewing, when the objects were at low altitude.

Oddly, all the internet videos seem to have been taken at midnight their time zone, right when people were watching fireworks displays. All the objects and descriptions of the objects seem to be very similar. Very strange phenomenon, indeed.