NUFORC Sighting 32955

Occurred: 2003-11-08 19:50 Local
Reported: 2003-11-08 23:57 Pacific
Duration: 30 seconds
No of observers: 2

Location: Bridgewater, NJ, USA

Shape: Light

During a lunar eclipse: faint reddish light zig-zagging swiftly away from the moon.

There was a lunar eclipse in NJ tonight, it started at 18:30 and was fully covered at 20:05. My boyfriend and I were standing out in a field in Bridgewater, NJ. There was very little ground light and you could see a lot of stars. The sky was very clear and there was very little cloud action. The moon was about 80-90% covered and he and I were looking around. Then he points up and says, "Do you see that?" I saw a very faint point of light. It wasn't emmitting it's own light though, it was as if it was reflecting. The light was a dark red. The moon at no point during my watch turned red from where I was. From what I understand, my cousin was watching from the next county over and said that the moon was an orangey-red.

Anyway, the light was traveling away from the moon quite swiftly, I would saw about 40-50 mph from the ground. Much faster than any plane that flies around here. It was moving quickly and I lost a couple times, but it was zig-zagging. When it would move sharply, I would pick it up again. It was unmistakable. The movement was very much like a bat, but it was up way too high to be a bat. Well above cloud level. The light zig-zagged away from the moon heading south, I believe. It didn't come any closer towards the earth, it traveled on the same plane, you know. It was very faint though. And we both saw it.

He said it was a UFO, that he'd seen a lot in Long Valley. I know it wasn't a shooting or falling star, I'd seen a lot of those in the Caribbean. He speculated it was a satellite, but I don't think those would be large enough to see from Earth. I saw this with my naked eye and I've never seen anything like it before. It was definitely not a plane, and I wonder if it was because of the eclipse, and the decreased amount of light that allowed us to spot it.

Posted 2003-11-11