NUFORC Sighting 08270

Occurred: 1999-07-05 00:07 Local
Reported: 1999-07-06 00:00 Pacific
Duration: @ 30 min.
No of observers: 6

Location: Knotts Island, NC, USA

Shape: Unknown
Characteristics: Left a trail

NUFORC Note:

This sighting occurred at the same time that two "Black Brant V" experiments were launched by missile out of the U. S. Navy Wallops Island, VA, Flight Test Facility. We believe that the brilliant display of the chemical released (trimethylaluminum) in the ionisphere almost certainly is what these observers witnessed.))

6 of us were in a boat in the dark and looking at the stars, we noticed what appeared to be like a vapor trail that was way up in the sky. The moon had not come up yet and the sky was dark except for the stars. The original trail ended with double swirl and then within several mins another trail started and made a wide circle that seemed to be like a coil spring looking down from the end. When you see a shooting star it usually is going across the sky, this seemed to be coming down but at great distance away, which gave it a real different prespective.

6 of us were on 2 boats, one was broken down and we were towing it home, we were in the back bay off of Knotts Island, below Norfolk, near Virginia Beach, on the inside of the outerbanks. We noticed what at first appeared to be a similar trail that a jet plane would leave except that it was totally dark, the moon hadn't come up yet and the sky was clear and dark. We all watched and assumed that it was some type of large meteor making an entry to the earth's atmosphere. About 5 mins after the first trail appeared a second one started which lasted longer than the first, they both covered a large section of the sky for as high up as they were. It was almost as if they were high enough up in the sky for the moon light to shine on the trails but the moon wasn't visable to us yet. The trails had a funny spiral to them, covered a large area of the sky and didn't look normal. The second trail acutally was in the same area as the first and they intersected, once the end of the trail happened the object that was making the trail got brighter and then it seemed to end. We watched the trails disapate for the next 40mins. Similar to jet trails.

Posted 1999-07-14