NUFORC Sighting 49544

Occurred: 2006-03-10 19:20 Local
Reported: 2006-03-11 23:20 Pacific
Duration: two minutes
No of observers: 0

Location: Pacheco, CA, USA

Shape: Light
Characteristics: Lights on object, Aura or haze around object

Planetary conjunction in Ursa Major? It's not possible

A planetary conjunction in Ursa Major? I couldn't believe my eyes. I was taking a walk just after dark in the Bay Area, after some rain had passed through. The sky was still hazy, but I could make out the brighter stars.

I always look up when I go outside, it's the amateur astronomer (for 25 years now) in me. Turning a street corner, something spectacular caught my eyes just above the stars Dubhe and Merak in the asterism the Big Dipper. The Big Dipper, standing in the sky with its handle down and dipper pointing up, I couldn't help but notice two bright yellow lights, the one on the right brighter and about one degree higher than the other.

At first, my mind automatically thought "planetary conjunction." I've seen many. They were both perfectly still. Then I realized the zodiac goes nowhere near the Dipper, thus no planets could be in that direction.

The bottom planet-like beacon looked like and was about as bright as Saturn is in the sky. The brighter one was about the brightness of Jupiter, but it was as yellow as the dimmer one.

I immediately turned and started to double-time back to the house for the camera, turning once half way to the house. When I turned that one time, the brighter one flared up and dimmed. The other was still there, but dimmed out 20 seconds after the first one did.

I checked the Heavens-Above website, because my first guess was the International Space Station. It turns out that the ISS was in the area ONE HOUR before my sighting, and this was two UFO's, not one.

Could anyone shed any light on this? My only guess is that it was something that separated from the ISS or something like that. No hoax, folks, this was the real deal. Thanks, Peter. Regards, MG from Pacheco.

Posted 2006-05-15