NUFORC Sighting 48941

Occurred: 2005-09-17 21:00 Local
Reported: 2006-01-30 22:48 Pacific
Duration: 5-7 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Tillamook/Bay City, OR, USA

Shape: Formation
Characteristics: Lights on object

Rows of very large bright Yellow/Orange panels of light above the ocean: 5 sightings in 7 minutes

Shortly after sunset at about 9:00 p.m. local time, on Saturday night, September the 17th, 2005 we were watching the western sky, focused on the sunset (sunset ahead due west, moonrise behind, due east). The sky was clear of clouds except for the distant horizon (West) which had clouds only at the base of the sky, and behind us there was a small bank of clouds through which the nearly full moon had just risen.

As we scanned the western horizon above remnants of the sunset, two of us saw 4, perhaps 5 repetitions of a light show. We saw a row (once two separate rows) of very bright yellow-orange lights, large rectanglular 'panels' of light perhaps 4 times as tall as they were wide, in a regular horizontal row. One of these phenomena involved two rows of lights next to each other, but not in the same-dimensional plane -- as if there were two objects giving off light that were not level with each other. The # of 'light panels' we saw at any given time varied from three to seven altogether; the time we saw seven there was a gap or space of darkness which provided a marker and it was as if the lights were slowly rotating out of sight on the right hand edge.

The lights were out over the ocean, perhaps 3 to 5 miles, about 15 or 20 degrees above the horizon from our vantage point. There were no other lights visible before, during or after we saw these lights (no running lights). No Sound we could hear above the surf. The lights were on, very bright light like looking through ports into a blast furnace, for 20 to 30 seconds, and they did not move, remained stationary in the sky, and then they would all turn off at once. The second set of lights was WNW or so, then the two sets of lights next to each other again due West, then one at WNW again, and finally one light due West down closer to the surface of the water that I saw with peripheral vision, only briefly. From one sighting to the next, the lights appeared in a different part of the sky, but at the same height, and after a 30 second to 1 minute pause. We never saw the outlines of craft, or saw the lights move at all when they were on. One of those times, my partner saw the lights reflect off the surface of the ocean, not as if searchlights, but just that the light was so strong and bright it clearly reached the water and bounced back up.

All of this happened within a span of 5-7 minutes, then it stopped. From that distance, we estimate these lights were something like 4 feet wide and 10 feet tall @ 2-3 miles away: they were huge and very bright.

Background: I practice Chinese Medicine; my friend is a Policy Analyst in state government. We were camping, and did not see anyone else around us at the time of the sighting.

Posted 2006-02-14