NUFORC Sighting 09533

Occurred: 1999-09-01 21:30 Local
Reported: 1999-09-02 00:00 Pacific
Duration: 20 seconds?
No of observers: 2

Location: Chico, CA, USA

Shape: Fireball
Characteristics: Aura or haze around object, Left a trail, Changed Color, Aircraft nearby

Four glowing objects slowly moving across the night sky, leaving a short trail.

At approximately 9:30pm on September 1, 1999, my girlfriend and I walked outside to go for a walk. Immediately, we both spotted four objects in the sky. The "head" of the objects were glowing, unsure of the color but I remember bluish/green and my girlfriend recalls at least one turning a reddish color. The objects seemed to be at a low altitude, but I'm not sure because I can't confirm how large the objects were. (MUCH bigger than a star....maybe 1/8 to 1/10 the size of a full moon? I couldn't hear any sound, but the objects moved very slowly. They were midway across the sky when we first observed them, and they remained visible for about 20 seconds before passing out of our line of sight. The first three objects were close together, almost in a formation, while the fourth was slightly behind and off center. They left a short smoky trail behind them, easily visible in the dark night sky. We've both seen many meteors, and this didn't conform with anything we've seen befor! e. Our first reaction was, "What is that?" The slow speed seemed to rule out a meteor or "shooting star" as did the strange color and the misty trail behind them. One final note, all the objects seemed to be travelling at the same rate of speed.

Posted 1999-09-12