NUFORC Sighting 80432

Occurred: 2011-03-10 07:46 Local
Reported: 2011-03-11 10:09 Pacific
Duration: 3 Minutes
No of observers: 1

Location: Lake Havasu City, AZ, USA

Shape: Disk
Characteristics: Aura or haze around object

Bright Amber Disk - Travels Across The Desert Sky

Thursday night at approximately 7:46 PM, I spotted a brilliant amber light in the North/ Western sky. I was sitting, facing East and the California side of the horizon from my home in Arizona. I am very, very familiar with the flight patterns from L.A. to Phoenix and back. Those travel East to West and visa versa and only shift latterly North and South depending on weather and other circumstances. I'll say that I see A LOT of interesting things in the sky and often around here. This one was absolutely amazing. Once I realized it was not a plane, I thought it could be the space shuttle. That had landed the day before so that was out. I then reasoned that it was the Mir. I ran and grabbed my binoculars to confirm. Not so much. I've seen the Mir 3 times in the last 5 years - Once with my naked eye at about the same time at night, once through my 12" dobby telescope and one other time just after dusk with my naked eye. This was not the Mir to the best of my know! ledge. It glowed more brightly than any star in the sky. It was a distinct orange "glow" which looks similar to reflected light from the Shuttle and Mir but through my binoculars, the light was steady, unwavering and stayed the same luminosity across the entire night sky. It travelled at approximately 1400 mph. I am basing that on what I have watched hundreds of times, commercial airliners traveling at anywhere from 600 to 700 mph. I could not tell altitude beyond about 30,000 feet. Through the binoculars, I could not make out any formation of wings, additional lights/strobes or physical features. To me, it looked exactly like a brightly glowing disk since the light was not round. It was very slightly oval. There was no atmospheric disruption that I could see. There was no propulsion or exhaust that I could see - Just a very bright and very steady moving object traveling from North to South in the clean night sky. The moon was visible but only a quarter-moon washed out the stars.

Posted 2011-03-23