NUFORC Sighting 62947

Occurred: 1997-03-26 22:30 Local
Reported: 2008-04-22 16:29 Pacific
Duration: 30-40 minutes
No of observers: 3

Location: Winslow, AZ, USA

Shape: Triangle
Characteristics: Lights on object, Aura or haze around object, Left a trail, Changed Colo

Triangle craft positioned over Winslow, AZ for 30-40 minutes

At approximately 21:50 on March 26, 1997, I left home with my mother to drop some items off to some friends at the Pilot travel center in the north part of Winslow (1/8 of a mile, perhaps, north of I-40), at the I-40 and North Park Drive interchange.

It didn't take long for us to drive from home, to the travel center, for me to run back and get back out to the car park. I think it was probably about 22:15 when we were leaving the travel center parking lot. As we were driving toward the traffic lights at the interchange, my mother had asked me what that streak across the sky was, and the object that was hovering high above the town. I had to squint hard to see it at that time, and at first dismissed it as Venus, as the twinkling colours looked the same. Then I realised that Venus was in the opposite (Eastern) part of the sky! We drove down North Park Drive to Aspinwall Street, and had nearly a dozen blocks to go before we arrived home. As we drove west down Aspinwall Street, the object started to become larger. Two blocks from home, it was apparent that this craft was waiting for us at the end of the street (it's a dead-end). At the same time, on the same block, my aunt's boyfriend was outside their home throwing out the rubbish and spotted this craft.

The craft was shaped like a equilateral triangle, silver in colour. The strangest part was it looked only like an outline of a triangle. It moved up and down, side to side, in a very quick manner. Like a helicopter, but with a million times more precision and speed. Its maneuvers were amazing-- I had never seen anything like it. The craft was riddled with several lights along the 'outline' of the triangle. They were mostly white, but would periodically change from white, to red and then to blue. As it moved, there was a sort of red and blue aura around it, and there were trails coming from these lights.

My mother drove the car to the very end of West Aspinwall Street. That area of the street is a dead end, blocked by a large hill. On the north side at the end of W. Aspinwall street, there is rather large empty field. My mother drove to the empty field and turned off the car lights, as well as the engine. I had her roll down the window. The craft was probably 150-200 feet above us (rough estimation), a bit to the west (above the hill). It's hard to tell the size of the craft; I'd say if I extended my arm all the way out, and made a fist, the sides of the craft would have been visible by about three inches or so. I'm not keen when it comes to distance measurements, so I could be off on how far up the craft was in the sky.

There was absolutely no noise coming from the craft. My mother started the car again, and we started to drive through the field. This is where I got very alarmed-- if our car was moving, it would move with us. If my mother would stop the car, it would stop its movements. My mother was trying to convince me to run in the house and grab a video camera, and my 35mm camera. There was no way I was getting out of that car! I urged her to drive back to the busy travel center we had just left from, as I felt safer there, amongst many people.

We drove back to the travel center and stayed in the car park and watched the craft hover, but slowly ascend until it was a small speck in the sky, then we saw it dart off to the west at an alarming rate of speed. After it dashed off, it was no longer visible.

This sighting, coincidentally, occurred on the same night as the Heaven's Gate suicide in the San Diego, Ca. area. We had arrived home around 23:00, just in time for Nightline (Ted Koppel). The feature story was on the mass suicide and the whole story involving the Hale Bopp comet. I honestly don't believe these two incidents were connected. They just happened to occur on the same night.

The following evening, my mother and I went to my aunt's house (she lived two blocks east of us). Her boyfriend kept asking us if we had gone out the previous night, and definitely beat around the bush regarding what he saw. He wouldn't come out and say it-- he wanted to know if we had seen anything. When we both confirmed that there was something in the sky, he showed me the drawings he made and description he wrote out. It was the same exact thing we saw.

At the time of the sighting, I was working for the local newspaper as an editorial assistant and photographer. I didn't report this to any local authorities, nor did I mention the incident to anyone I worked with, although the newspaper's editor did mention a rash of phone calls that came in to the local police department.

Additionally, one of the local police officers had come into my mother's hair salon for a haircut, and had mentioned to my aunt (his hairdresser; same aunt I previously mentioned, whose boyfriend saw the craft at the end of our street) that approximately two dozen reports had been made that night. It was then that she told the officer what her boyfriend saw.

My mother and I heard from friends that there were sightings of the same craft the following night, in the Camp Verde/Cottonwood/Clarkdale area of Arizona.

Posted 2008-06-12