NUFORC Sighting 18300

Occurred: 2001-07-04 00:00 Local
Reported: 2001-07-04 00:00 Pacific
Duration: ~ 1 minute
No of observers: 1

Location: Kennewick, WA, USA

Shape: Orb
Characteristics: Lights on object, Emitted other objects, Aircraft nearby

Silent, orange ball of light seen crossing the night sky in Kennewick, WA.

I was looking out my window towards the north and noticed a bright orange light appearing to be rising from several miles away, as it broke over the shadow. The object was first thought to be a large firework, but the object did not explode, nor did it stop rising after several seconds. I then thought that it might be an airplane taking off, as the airport is in that general direction. The object then appeared to stop rising and track horizontally and southward after it had risen approximately three finger widths at arms length. At that point, the odd nature of the object instilled curiosity and a desire for further investigation. I went outside, and through my binocularts tracked the object as it approached me at somewhat an obliwue angle. My binocular power setting was high at first, and revealed what appeared to be two orange lights seperated by a small distance. My hands were shakey, and at that power things were hard to focus, so my thought was that it was an airplane with wing-tipped landing/takeoff lights. However, it struck me that the object was making no sound and the typical red and green marker lights were not seen. I then reduced the power on the binoculars, making it much easier to focus the object, and the thing I saw revealed itself. The object had a large central orange ball of light, in which a smaller orange ball of light circled at approximately one orbit per second. Several seconds later orange debree was seen falling from the object, and slowly fading in color, as though it were cooling, and disapperaed prior to reaching the level of the trees and houses across the way. It was then that I thought the object might be burning material caught on an updraft and prevailing winds, but there were not winds sufficient enough to move the object across the sky as fast as it was travelling, nor did the object's shape and characteristic change after the falling debree. I continued to track the object for several more seconds until it just vanished. Through the entire incident no sound was heard, and no other color was seen other than the orange of the two balls of light. Whether it was one object or two is not known to me. I wonder if others have seen this same object and can confirm what I observed.

Posted 2001-08-05

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