NUFORC Sighting 20473

Occurred: 2001-11-17 22:30 Local
Reported: 2001-11-18 19:15 Pacific
Duration: 5 minutes
No of observers: 1

Location: Auburn, WA, USA

Shape: Formation
Characteristics: Aura or haze around object

3 sets of 2-4 objects flying in formation that were a semi-rectangular shape with a hazy aura around them as if entering the atmosphere

I work in the Auburn Washington area and taking periodic breaks to run outside and see if I could spot any of the expected meteors from the Leonid shower. It was really early so I would have been surprised to see anything but a few sporadic meteors. My real excitement happened around 10:30! There were 3 sets in all and showed up approximately 1-2 minutes apart. The first set, there were 3 in this first set (if i recall correctly), was travelling from south to north, from approximately the Cetus constellation through perhaps as far as the tail of Draco before fading out as if they had entered the atmosphere. They did not burn out or burst like a meteor might, the just faded. I was looking straight up from my location and facing east. If I had to guess at a speed, they were moving at somewhere over 3 times the speed of sound, but nowhere near the speed of what you'd expect a meteor to travel at, and being a poor judge of speeds that high I could be way off. They were in formation and did not appear to move apart or together. I saw 2 more sets that were approximately the same in charateristics. They were in formation, and they were at the same speed. The 2nd set contained 4, and the 3rd set contained 2. There may have been more, but thinking this was part of the meteor shower, and very different than any other I'd ever seen, I ran inside to grab the nearest co-worker to let them know that the meteors were really cool looking! We were back outside within 3 minutes, but no other appearances were made by these odd objects that I saw.

The easiest description I could give of these objects were that they looked like the effects given to photon torpedos...ya, like in star trek! The had a hazy redish-orange effect while they were seemingly entering the earth's atomsphere. The shape that I recall was semi-rectangular; maybe a 1x3 or 1x4 ratio. Other than that, I couldn't make out any other specific traits about them.

Like I said, these...things....were definitely NOT meteors! I saw them all within about a 3 or 4 minute period and at around 10:30pm.

Posted 2001-11-20