NUFORC Sighting 142845

Occurred: 2018-08-14 21:00 Local
Reported: 2018-08-29 20:52 Pacific
Duration: 4-5 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Sausalito, CA, USA

Shape: Circle
Characteristics: Lights on object

Whitish star performs symmetrical acrobatics overhead for 4-5 minutes

My wife saw the small "planet-like" light first as she looked almost vertically overhead. I (her husband) looked up a minute or more later and also saw it hovering in the clear, dark sky. To both of us it seemed to adopt a fixed "central" or "home" location above us but would then very rapidly disappear and reappear in a new location that we estimated to be about six inches (on a ruler held at arm's length) away where it stopped for about 2 seconds. It then returned to its "central" location again for another 2-3 seconds before flitting away in another direction to a new location at the same angular distance as the first. This went on for around five minutes. If all of the object's/light's positions were connected with a line it would have been an approximate circle with a diameter of about 10 inches (on same ruler) or about 18 - 20 deg. arc.

How did it disappear? Over some minutes the "central" position seemed to drift toward the south (it continued its symmetrical disappearing-reappearing act)where it eventually dimmed out completely. It seemed to be at a pretty high altitude, was whitish or silverish, between a star and a planet in angle (no shape could be seen), it was completely quiet, and we saw no airplanes in the sky at any time during the sighting. The object's brightness never changed and it left no visible trail or contrail. Winds were off the ocean and very clear (of smoke) that night. We know of no earth tremors either just before, during, or after the sighting. We reported it the next day to Dr. Haines by phone.

Posted 2018-08-31