NUFORC Sighting 10217

Occurred: 1999-10-12 21:35 Local
Reported: 1999-10-14 00:00 Pacific
Duration: 5 minutes
No of observers: 3

Location: Port Townsend, WA, USA

Shape: Triangle


3 satellites forming a perfect isosceles triangle shape, moving in complete unison from the NW to the SE and turning to the South.

My son and I like to look for satelites when the sky is clear. This night was very clear in our area, so we went out a little after 9:00pm to have a look. We were looking straight up and a bit towards the North. My son was pointing out the constellations to me as he likes to do. We had just located Casseopia and the Pleades when right at that moment, from the West, we saw a marvelous shooting star with a long tail. We both thought it must have made it to the earth intact. We kept looking for satelites, but found none. We did see alot of shooting stars however, just like the meteor showers. As we were looking for moving objects my son finally said "I found one." He was pointing it out to me and as I was turning to have a look, he yelled out "No, it's three of them... together, they're moving together!!" I turned and saw what he was looking at. It was 3 satellites forming a perfect isosceles triangle and traveling in formation at exactly the same speed. They never broke foramation or changed their speed which was slightly slower than most satellites we watch. They looked like a small constellation traveling across the night sky. They traveled from the NW to the SE and seemed to slowly veer more Southerly. It took about 3-4 minutes for them to travel across the sky and we watched them travel until they faded out of our sight range. My other son came out to watch them also. We all remarked about how it could not be one big object because as it passed by other stars we could still see the stars through it... it was not solid. We have never seen 3 satellites travel in formation before and this was quite a unique experience for us.



NUFORC Note:

These probably are U. S. Navy satellites, flying in formation for some reason.


Posted 1999-10-19

© 2023 National UFO Reporting Center. All rights reserved. Use or reproduction within any application without written consent is prohibited.