NUFORC Sighting 8660

Occurred: 1999-08-17 05:50 Local
Reported: 1999-08-17 00:00 Pacific
Duration: 15 min
No of observers: 3

Location: Portland, OR, USA

Shape: Other

Stationary object over downtown Portland Oregon, white in color shaped like 3-pointed star or "Y".

At 05:50 on August 17, 1999, I was standing on a sidewalk across the street from the baseball stadium in downtown Portland Oregon, waiting for a bus. I looked up at a twin-engine Cessna climbing out southward (roughly 1500 feet as it passed overhead) and noticed a small speck apparantly far above it. At first I thought this was sunlight reflecting off a high-altitude jet. (While it was quite light enough to read, the sun was not yet actually over the horizon, so it would reflect from a high-altitude object even though we were in shadow.) I watched to see whether this "jet" was going south or north. (Almost all high altitude air traffic here is to San Francisco or Seattle.) It did neither, but rather stayed in one place. After a couple of minutes of this, I checked to see if the scattered cirrus clouds were moving. They were drifting slowly westward. At the surface, we had a breeze moving from north to south. In either case the object should have drifted (if loose), but did not. I looked carefully to see if I could detect any bobbing or any air patterns that might indicate this was something much smaller and closer, such as a tethered balloon, but another airplane went by climbing out, and passed between me and the object, so I concluded that it was likely higher than the plane. Also, I saw no bobbing movements or shadows anywhere indicating a tether. (They might exist, but I did not see any.) After a few minutes, the angle with the sun had changed enough that I did not get a specular reflection, but a diffuse one. The object appeared to be white, and shaped like a "Y". On the other hand, it was extremely small and so I can't guarantee that I wasn't seeing glare or artifacts from my eyeglasses. About this time the thing seemed to rotate a little bit, then move a few feet, and then hover again, as though it were under control and "keeping station." It repeated this behavior occassionally until I lost sight of it. The object continued to stay in place, with no noticable changes, until my bus came at 06:05, when I lost sight of if. At this point, other boarding passengers asked what I was looking at, and so I pointed it out. Two saw it right away, both shrugged. At about 06:15 I tried to find it again after I got off the bus in Northwest Portland, but was unsuccessful. ====== end of report I have the feeling that this was some kind of recon aircraft, but it's the frist sighting I've had I can't actually explain away. I'm a licensed pilot, have a degree in physics, have done professional photojournalism, and now write software. Even if I'd had a camera, there wasn't much to take a picture of without a very long lens. The phone number is at home. If you call, please do so in the evening, when I'm likely to be home.(not that this sighting needs much work ...)

Posted 1999-08-30