NUFORC Sighting 69412

Occurred: 2009-03-26 21:00 Local
Reported: 2009-03-28 12:45 Pacific
Duration: over 5 hours
No of observers: 2

Location: Wilbraham, MA, USA

Shape: Oval
Characteristics: Lights on object, Changed Colo

Red light moving object turns into white light stationary star like object.

On 03/26/09 at 21:00 hours I witnessed an oval to circular shaped object moving from the Northeast sky to directly East of my position, it’s altitude was approximately 22° to 27° altitude from O° Horizon (level). I was not able to judge distance except to say that it was far past my digital camera and video camera range. There was no way to focus on this object with consumer level equipment and may have even been difficult for professional equipment to focus on.

I tried to photograph it in every way I could think of but could not.

When I first noticed the object it was in the area of being North / North-East moving southerly toward a position east of my view. The only reason I noticed it was due to it’s movement, it was clearly slower then an airplane and going approximately at satellite speed but it’s position in the sky and luminescence was all wrong for any satellite and there are no stars of that magnitude in this area of the sky and no objects that move horizontally without gaining altitude. It also changed appearance with a range of colors from white to bright yellow into deep red and back again.

The color shift happened only during the time it traveled but stopped shifting once it stopped traveling.

It began, or I first noticed it, at 42.5° N moving to and ending at a point just over 41.5° N or in other words a horizontal southerly distance totaling about 40° along the horizon.

It ended up being exactly east of my viewing position. I suspect it also came toward me but had no way to judge its depth other then an increase of magnitude, its size appeared to stay somewhat constant.

(Please note the longitude, latitude and angular measures are only approximations; I have not gone back and measured those.) While it traveled and changed color the red shifting was most notable because it appeared to have a deep red sphere inside of its shape that swirled counterclockwise. The red color was contained within the sphere and was about 30% of the total size, the motion of the red shape was erratic and wild but the main motion was counterclockwise the motion was almost like a pinball machine gone berserk..

Within the first few minutes of spotting this I called my wife to verify what I was seeing, she then said “I see those things all the time, around 3:00am and they are closer to the house”. She takes these things with a very cavalier attitude and doesn’t share an interest in any extra-terrestrial activities and treats these occurrences as everyday events for some reason. If she were to see an E.T in person she would say “oh that’s nice…” and then walk away.

After questioning her it appears this has happened before in much the same way only closer to the house and moving faster.

She does not understand why I have any level of excitement over this.

The event lasted until the object stopped and remained stationary, it moved for a period of about 15 minutes yet was stationary for at least two hours, anyone seeing it after it now stopped would believe it to be a star, it had no outstanding lighting or motion and stayed in a fixed position, eventually after unsuccessfully trying to photograph it I gave up on viewing it, my wife’s comments took a lot of wind out of my sails, my total viewing time was about 1 hour.

Her total viewing time was around 10 minutes and she verified the size, shape, motion and color of this with no emotion.

Now that I know this is / was not a one time event I have my eye to the sky more often.

Posted 2009-04-14