NUFORC Sighting 21873

Occurred: 2002-02-17 16:00 Local
Reported: 2002-02-17 16:52 Pacific
Duration: 1 hour
No of observers: 2

Location: Lavonia, GA, USA

Shape: Unknown
Characteristics: Aura or haze around object, Left a trail

Daylight sighting over Georia

I was on I85 heading from Lavonia, GA towards Atlanta, GA. My mother and I saw what at first appeared to be a plane crashing. We did not have a camera or a telescope. The oject was red with a long tail coming from it. My mom and I decided that it must be a meteor, however in a few minutes, the tail disappeared and the object began climbing up towards another object in the sky that we had not at first noticed. The two objects were beside one another for a few seconds, then one went straight up into the sky, and the second one began to descend. The one that was climbing up looked kind of like a squid because of the twin trails of smoke coming from behind it. We lost the descending one behind trees in the distance, and the ascending one became blocked from our view by the sun. There were a lot of other cars on the interstate during this event, but I do not honestly know if anyone else witnessed it. I have never seen anything like it before and didn't know where to go to research this information.

Posted 2002-02-22