NUFORC Sighting 42784

Occurred: 2005-03-04 13:15 Local
Reported: 2005-03-07 16:48 Pacific
Duration: 10 minutes
No of observers: 4

Location: North Carolina (in flight), NC, USA

Shape: Changing

Seen from plane window a long black line suspended at 35,000 ft as viewed from airplane

March 4/05 while flying from Atlanta to Washington D.C. (Dulles) about mid way into the flight somewhere over North Carolina during beverage service, I looked out the window of the plane to the left and saw this long thin black line suspended at 35,000 feet. I looked again several times because I couldn't believe what I saw. I summoned a flight attendent and she also looked out the window. I asked if it was a weather balloon, and she said no. She said she needed to notify the pilot. After calling the pilots, she returned to my seat and said they had never seen anything like this either.

While I was observing the long black line which was VERTICAL,it slowly began to rotate from the bottom to the top to now become horizontal. During this rotation it looked liked a black ribbon being blown in a light breeze until it became horizontal. I continued looking until it was out of my vision.

The flight was Delta 224

NUFORC Note:

Witness elects to remain totally anonymous. We first wondered whether the witness might have been looking at the shadow which can be cast by an overhead contrail, but that could not be the case if the flight crew was mystified by the object, too. PD

Posted 2005-04-16