NUFORC Sighting 70856

Occurred: 2009-07-04 21:46 Local
Reported: 2009-07-04 20:10 Pacific
Duration: approx 1.5 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Algonquin, IL, USA

Shape: Light
Characteristics: Lights on object

Single fire colored object spotted moving in a slow and nonlinear way

During the normal Independence day celebrations going on in my neighborhood, my 10 year daughter and I had seen what immediately looked like a firework of some sort way in the distance. However, it became apparent after a few seconds that this was no firework even though it had the glowing color of a yellow/orange fire because it was moving way too slowly. The movement from our vantage point first moved from right to left fairly slowly which seemed like it could have been an airplane. However, after about 30 seconds of this right to left slow movement the object was still for about 10 to 15 seconds. Then the object moved very little from left to right for a short time of around 10 seconds. Immediately thereafter, the movement started going down towards the earth in a straight line. This downward movement lasted about 15 to 20 seconds as the fire type light started to fade away in intensity. After the full downward movement of 20 seconds or so the light did indeed fade into darkness.

From my observation the best explanation I could come up with is the fire light might have been possibly an airplane which was engulfed in flames or perhaps an erratic moving missile which seems more unlikely. In any case, this could not have been a type of fancy firework considering how long it lasted and the nonlinear movement.

Posted 2009-08-05