NUFORC Sighting 39895

Occurred: 2004-10-15 22:30 Local
Reported: 2004-10-22 08:10 Pacific
Duration: 10-15 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Rock Hill, SC, USA

Shape: Light
Characteristics: Lights on object, Aircraft nearby

We watched a faint light, high in the sky, blink every ten seconds and made several changes in direction before gmoving out of sight.

On October 15th, around 10:30 pm, my husband & I were sitting on the back deck of our home in the country, looking at the night sky. WE are a mile outside the Rock Hill, SC city limits.It was clear and there were many stars visible. Toward the S-SE, I saw a faint blink of a light high in the sky. I watched & 10 seconds later, saw it again. There was no sound.

I looked through my binoculars & told my husband to look in that direction & saw the blink again. Through the binoculars I could only see the light blink. I could not see any outline of an object. Several commercial airplanes flying at high altitude flew over as we watched. The flash seemed to be much higher than these.

I switched to my monocular nightscope & continued watching the flash, which came every 10 seconds. Through the nightscope, I was able to see many more stars & got a fix on the flash's position based on 2 stars close by. The light moved slightly to the East, stopped, moved to the west, then north. It made several more moves, then moved due east & out of the area with the 2 stars. It was soon out of view because of trees & my roofline.

A minute later we saw with the naked eye, a dim object moving south to north along the same area of sky. It moved out of sight. Another couple of minutes later we saw a similar object moving north to south on the opposite path. I watched it with the nightscope & it suddenly flared up very brightly & then dimmed until I could hardly see it. It moved out of sight. These 2 objects appeared to be satelites, except for the flare-up.

After that, we observed 3 meteors in that same area. (The Orionids are visible now) I have watched every night since & have not see it again. The next day a high altitude plane made many Y-shaped contrails across the sky. I actually watched as it cut off the contrail to connect the Y. This happened for 2 days in a row. I don't know if there is a conection or not.

Our Bio info is as follows: I am a 47 yr old SCUBA Instructor. I also was in Civil Air Patrol while in high school & earned my observer wings. I have flown in many types of aircraft & spent a lot of time on Air Force bases. I have lived under the flight path of Charlotte Douglas International airport for 14 yrs. I saw my first UFO with my family when I was around 10 yrs old.

My husband is a corporate exec in the IT field. He is very analytical & tries to reason through sightings like this, but was truly stumped & a little un-nerved by this.

((AMENDMENT TO ORIGINAL REPORT))

Amendment to previous report on 10/22/04

This is an ammendment to my previous report dated 10/22/04. I got the times mixed up on the 2 objects that were a few minutes apart going in opposite directions. They were right after dark on Oct 15th. The object that blinked every 10 seconds was between 10 & 10:30 PM & there were commercial aircraft flying in the same area of sky during the sighting but the object appeared to be much higher in the sky. After reading up on satelites, I believe the 2 objects were satelites, with the one that flared being an irridium flare. The 3rd object, however, has me stumped.

((END))

Posted 2004-10-27